


Nomad, Shin's Story

by darkryuu



Series: Legacy [11]
Category: Harvest Moon, Rune Factory (Video Games), Story of Seasons: Trio of Towns
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/F, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-05
Updated: 2020-08-31
Packaged: 2021-02-24 15:40:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 21
Words: 310,377
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21680323
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/darkryuu/pseuds/darkryuu
Summary: Growing up, Shin (Toy) always wanted to do the right thing for everyone that he could, especially those in need. But can he keep from losing sight of himself, his family, and his friends, especially his elusive best friend, Lyla, and new partner in life, Komari? A prequel to Step Toward the Future.
Series: Legacy [11]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/20840
Kudos: 1





	1. Roots

**Nomad,** Shin’s Story **  
Chapter 1:** Roots  
  
**Author’s Notes:** Hello! No goals of wrapping up ENDGAME’s Sidequests will be met this year because my immune system is on some new garbage XD Bronchitis to a sinus infection in like a month? Was never THIS bad, even with all my stupid immuno-deficient diseases. But, since we’re about to enter our next decade, figure I’ll release a throwback.

If you’ve followed any of the Legacy story, you may be familiar with Shin, the oldest brother of the Yagami Six. He is in the military and is also a cop, usually responsible for pulling some insider stuff for the family. This is sort of his origin story. Dirty (2016) is the very beginning but that’s more about Yamada than Shin. Also, that one is in and out of the past. This one is going to chronologically move forward…sort of. You’ll see.  
  
I really wanted this to stay in only Shin’s POV but I might occasionally jump out when it’s like…super important to. Also, I am finally, a hundred percent, after sixteen years, going to move toward uncensored language. I know, it’s been a long time coming but old habits, my friends.

So this one, it starts off slow. It’s building up but it’s going to get…aggressive. I won’t say it ends sadly either (well, duh) but it’s not the sparkliest of my settings. However, it gets better which is the motto, I suppose. **Light content in this one _._** But the bad stuff is to come…

Happy Reading~

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Yagami Shin remembered it like it was yesterday.

The truth of the matter was, when he and papa first moved from Wasaba to the big house in Subami, he hated it. It was just too big. No one was around them either, not like in the apartments. He couldn’t run next door quite as easily to play with the neighbor’s kids, with his friend Joe, or get cookies from the aunties. Yes, he knew they had to do it, that they had to move for his brother Koji’s sake but that didn’t mean he didn’t hate it.

One fateful day, he recalled he was going to try to run away to Wasaba for a while. A stupid six-year-old kid with no sense of direction and he pretty much made it to the backyard next door. It was weird, like he was going through a jungle at first. There were so many plants and flowers he’d never seen _ever_. It just kept getting thicker and thicker the further he went and Shin remembered panicking. In the movies, that was the part where the monster showed up.  
  
“Papa! Papa?!” he called, freaking out.  
  
He shouldn’t have tried to run! Or go anywhere without mama or papa’s permission! He’d never do it again if he could just make it out of the jungle! Sweating, he bit his lip and saw a break of light. This was where the monster was. Or the tiger. He was going to be eaten by a tiger.  
  
Trembling, Shin reached out and pushed the last bit of vine out of the way and awaited his fate.

It was neither tiger nor monster but that moment changed his life forever. His eyes widened when he heard cheerful humming as a little girl swung on a wooden swing dangling from a big tree. Shin recalled watching to figure out if she were a fairy or an angel. Her eyes…were this pretty verdant color. And her hair was definitely pink! That was so wild!

Suddenly she looked up and gasped. Oh…oh no, he was going to scare her. However, she stared back at him for a long moment, seeming unfazed. “…Oh. Are you one of the boys from next door?”  
  
“Eh? Next door?”  
  
“Mm hmm. We’re neighbors.”  
  
He just had to go through a _jungle_ to get to his neighbor! He didn’t like this at all! He blinked at her. Well…maybe. “Yea. My name’s Yagami Shin.”  
  
She got down from her swing, dusting off that cute bouncy dress she used to wear that was covered in flower prints. “Hello. My name is Okamoto Lyla.”  
  
Lyla… “That’s a really pretty name” Shin murmured.  
  
“Really? Everyone at school thinks it’s funny. Where do you go to school? I never see you.”  
  
“Subami Primary.”  
  
She nodded, “That’s why. I go to private school.”  
  
Mama had said something about private school for him and his brothers but papa just looked kind of mean about it. Or not mean but like he didn’t want to. Now Shin kind of wished he hadn’t been. His eyes widened when she got closer. They used to be the same height back then. “Yagami Shin-san, why are you here?”  
  
“O-Oh, I got lost. I was thinking about visiting where we used to live.”  
  
Lyla nodded, “Oh, okay. Next time, you should come play with me. I don’t have many friends.”  
  
… “Well, I think it’d be a long walk to where we used to live anyway. I can play now.”  
  
She brightened and they scurried around, playing make believe that tigers and wild monsters were lurking in the forest. They’d dash to escape the chase and skitter around full of fearful glee. It was different than playing hide-and-seek in the apartments but he enjoyed it quite a bit.

Around four, the voice of a woman called out to Lyla from her mansion. She stopped running and pouted, calling back, “Coming!”  
  
Oh, maybe someone was looking for him too. Lyla turned back to him, seeming hopeful, “You’ll come back again, right?”  
  
He nodded. “I might have to stay inside tomorrow but next day.”  
  
“Okay! Bye bye!”  
  
Shin watched as she pranced for the deck of the home before making his way back the way he came through the lush forest. He took a deep breath when he was back in his backyard which actually mirrored Lyla’s quite a bit with flowers and nature running wild. He actually…could see that now. It…it wasn’t so bad.

For everything else that happened, Yagami Shin remembered that like it was yesterday.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
_Yagami Shin watched as Okamoto Lyla aimed the white and gray gun at the screen of their big screen, watching tentatively before pulling the trigger. She pouted when the obnoxious dog snickered at her missed attempt. “Aww…”  
  
She flopped dramatically beside him and handed the gun to him. He nodded and shot down the cartoon ducks at ease. Lyla gave him a pouty look and he handed it back, smiling, “Look at the pointer in the back, it helps.”  
  
Lyla tried it and improved significantly. “You’re so smart, Shin. Have you ever held a real gun?”  
  
“Well…dad doesn’t like them” Shin explained.  
  
Somehow he figured she approved of this. Lyla was such a peaceful being. She had been somewhat appalled by even the video game ‘Duck Hunt’ until he convinced her this was to keep people from hunting real ducks. She reluctantly played but told him irritably that now she had to shoot cartoon ducks because of that ‘dumb dog snickering like a lunatic’._

_Moving quickly, a young woman entered with a tray of snacks and set it on the coffee table some feet away from them. Shin recalled when Lyla first invited him inside and he saw her. She didn’t look like Lyla so he asked if she were a sister or cousin. She seemed bewildered. “That’s our maid.”  
  
A maid. As in, someone that got paid to take care of their stuff. His mama and papa didn’t have maids or servants. Lyla had seemed perplexed so he invited her over.  
  
It was weird introducing her to his siblings, to six-year-old Koji and Nerimaru, two year old Jill and Tony, and just one year old Shaun. Lyla had gasped. “You have so many siblings!”  
  
Nerimaru was staring pensively at her hair but for once in his life kept his mouth closed. Koji didn’t seem to mind, asking, “You don’t have siblings?”  
  
“No, I’m an only child” she sighed gravely, “I have cousins though.”  
  
That, they didn’t have to their knowledge. Shin prepared them a snack and Lyla was delighted. “I want to make you a snack next time you’re over!”  
  
Well, she’d tried but that was met by the dismay of her father, Okamoto Bajiru.  
  
Shin’s papa used to be home a lot more, probably because Shin didn’t have five siblings and a mama there full-time. That was something else he missed from Wasaba. Nowadays, papa would come home and immediately fall asleep before being summoned back to the hospital maybe an hour later. Nevertheless, his papa was the best and Shin was proud to have him as his father.  
  
That said, Okamoto Bajiru was weird in Shin’s book.  
  
He spoke weird to Lyla’s mama and her. Unlike Shin’s papa who spoke like he was having a conversation, Lyla’s papa spoke like he’d seen people speak to dogs. And meanly to dogs, at that. ‘Don’t speak that loudly, it’s not woman-like’. ‘Keep that dress pulled below your ankle, people will talk’. What did that mean? People will talk about their ankles? Who did that?  
  
One day, when they were around ten, it redirected to him. He overheard when he came to look for Lyla in the backyard. The window was open and the man was speaking loudly enough that Shin could discern what was being said. ‘It’s unthinkable to let her hang around some boy! And did you hear about his family? A cheating mother that ran around with some half-bred Japanese man? Lyla is not to see him again!’._

_Half-bred. Cheating mother. Shin had been privy to that knowledge early. Had to be because it shaped their circumstances. His mama and papa married first, just like Lyla’s parents. They married and they had him but mama’s family didn’t want that. They made her marry Domo. The same monster that hurt his brother and, Nerimaru told him, hurt their mama. He swallowed hard and walked back to his house. He…_

_Lyla was his best friend. Four years. Despite her going to an all-girl school now and not seeing her all that often, she was his best friend. They would write letters to one another and hid them in their secret spot to plan adventures. He got a walky-talky set for his birthday and gave her one to speak to her at night. Lately she’d even sneak over at night and they would play until they fell asleep. She would leave early in the morning but that…that was his best friend. If her papa would separate them because of him being a boy and then because of what his family had been through though…_

_Shin would always remember going home and miserably watching his brothers play Street Fighter II. They…there was nothing wrong with them. Why…why would her papa think so? And what was so bad about a girl and a guy befriending one another, huh?  
  
He recalled not looking up when the doorbell rang. Mama was probably getting a visitor. Koji was the one to pause and look back, his brows furrowed, “That’s Lyla, go get it.”  
  
Koji and Nerimaru seemed impressed with Lyla. They liked her a lot and she was like…like one of their family. What…was so wrong with his family? Shin was going to say ‘no, it’s not. Something’s wrong with us’. The wrong sort of wrong where they’d done what they had to do but people like her papa made them out to be bad. Instead, he wistfully wandered to the front door to tell whomever his mama would be right down.  
  
“Hi, Shin!”  
  
He had been confused as Lyla pushed past him, acceptable as she was one of them now. She still would kick off her shoes, saying she wasn’t sure how to feel about shoes in the house though the Yagami clan didn’t do that. Jill was playing with her dolls in the room with Koji and Nerimaru, squealing and imploring the closest thing their only sister had to a sister to play with her. Lyla obliged and sat on the floor with her while Shin watched her, befuddled. Taking a seat slowly, he could only nod dumbly when Nerimaru asked that he play next. Oh…okay.  
  
The younger of them finally ran off to do something else while Lyla sat on the couch next to him, watching Dragon Quest. Why…? Shin slowly looked to Lyla. “…Lyla.”  
  
“Yes, Shin?”  
  
“I…I accidentally overheard your dad. When I came over to get you, I-I heard him through the window. I mean, I went…went through the trees so I was in the backyard.”  
  
Lyla blinked, confused, as he swallowed. “…He-He said we shouldn’t hang out together. Because of my family—because I’m a boy.”  
  
“Yea, papa doesn’t believe in mixing genders until an arranged marriage is set up” she nodded, seeming unconcerned.  
  
“Then…?” Why…was she here?  
  
“Papa’s always telling mama and me what isn’t right and what a lady should be” Lyla yawned, grabbing the throw blanket from the arm of the couch, “I listen to him. I told him I listen to him—so he should just let me have my friend.”  
  
Shin’s eyes widened as she threw the blanket over her legs, “He tried to fuss about it but I told him I don’t ask for a whole lot either. He didn’t seem to know what to say so I left and came over.”  
  
…Oh. Nodding, he played with a loose strand on his jeans, looking back at the television. “O-Oh, okay. You…you think you’ll get in trouble?”  
  
“I doubt it. He would have stopped me.”  
  
“Ah…”  
  
He guessed he remembered that maybe some time after that, something may have changed. No, at ten, he didn’t think anything like ‘this is going to be my future anything’. Not the way Koji did about the girl he met in Mineral Town when he went to stay with their grandpa. But…something changed.  
  
…He did.  
  
_XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
1992.

_Come as you are, as you were, as I want you to be. As a friend, as a friend, as an old enemy. Take your time, hurry up; the choice is yours, don’t be late. Take a rest, as a friend, as an old memory-ah._

Yagami Shin munched on a bag of chips as he sat in his room on the floor with his stereo, listening to the song for the fifth time today. Koji was stretched out on his bed, reading a music magazine while Nerimaru played on the Gameboy they had all gotten for Christmas. It was kind of neat but Shin preferred the consoles.

“We should just ask dad to go, Shin. What could he even say? ‘Nah, I don’t think it’s a good idea’?” Koji said after a long period of silence.  
  
Shin sulked, “That’s _exactly_ what dad could say. You’re just 11.”  
  
Koji rolled his eyes. Nerimaru, adapted nickname ‘Nelly’, didn’t look up but retorted, “He can be there though. He might not like it but if he’d be that worried about something happening to us…”  
  
Most of their radio was Japanese. They grew up on both Japanese and American music mostly from their mother. But it was _old_ American music, stuff from when she was their age. It was okay, just…  
  
Shin remembered a Japanese disc jockey going on excitably about this ‘new sound’ from the United States before playing it. It. It was so different from anything he’d heard that Shin had to look up from the studying he was doing and just completely stop to digest what he was hearing. His English was good, he felt, but he had to write down the song title to make sure he could comprehend its meaning: Smells Like Teen Spirit.  
  
It was _spectacular_. He got Koji and Nelly in on it too. The younger kids were still passé about that stuff but they were so excited. They ventured off on their own to find the cassette, searching at least a dozen shops before finding the one eclectic one with the baby swimming in a pool. Nevermind.  
  
Their papa seemed a little confused when he found them listening to it, questioning as casually as he could ‘why are they yelling?’. Dunno, but it was awesome! Yagami Yamada just smiled and nodded before wandering off. Oh well, they got it. And so did she…  
  
Okamoto Lyla peeked into the room before skipping in, wearing a long jean skirt and a blouse. At 12, she seemed to dress…a lot older than other girls he saw. Probably her dad. “Hey, Lyla.”  
  
“Hey, guys!”  
  
Sitting on the bed, she made a face, probably because they had already worn out one cassette of Nevermind as is and were ready to wear out their second. “C’mon, guys, we should go find the other album—the Bleach one.”  
  
“We should” agreed Koji, “And what’s that other band? Red Hot Chili Peppers?”  
  
Lyla nodded, “I heard a rumor they’re gonna be here in May.”  
  
Nelly leered, finally looking up from some weird game…Sonic the Hedgehog. Shin had never even known hedgehogs existed until that game. “See? We can go to _all_ of those, Shin.”  
  
Shin pursed his lips, glancing off, as Lyla looked perplexed. “Go to all what?”  
  
“Nirvana is going to be here next month too, in Tokyo.”  
  
Like him, the idea that they could possibly, oh, do something as grown up as go to a concert seemed to perplex Lyla. “I…I mean, we’re kind of young, right? I mean—I _want_ to see them, definitely…”  
  
“Yea, but who knows if they’ll even come back to Japan” Koji countered, “It’s weird they’re coming now.”  
  
True. Nelly snorted and stretched, pushing his legs over the side of the bed, “Shin should ask dad. He’s his favorite anyway.”  
  
“I am not!” scowled Shin, glowering at Nelly.  
  
Koji yawned, setting the magazine aside and cracking his neck as he also sat up, “If anything, he’ll hear you out a bit more though. You’re the oldest.”  
  
“W-Well, maybe…”  
  
“And you, nee-san, will just have to sneak and go with us. Say you’re over here and we went out for dinner” Koji nodded.  
  
Lyla looked horrified by the idea of deceit. As she _should be_. Koji and Nelly were going to be such troublemakers—were? They already were but given a little more age, Shin could tell they were going to be really…free.

Except, when the twins convinced them to go to the local music store, Lyla was quite excited to do so. Generally it didn’t seem like her dad wanted her to leave the house. They were next door so she got a little bit of area added to her barrier. Shin figured he didn’t know they went _outside._ Okamoto Bajiru…never actually put his foot down on her being with them. Yet.  
  
Lyla rode on the back of his bike as they made their way into downtown Subami. He, Koji, and Nelly had to teach Lyla how to ride a bike, a very whimsical experience. Her father found it distasteful so usually she would ride Jill’s but she was getting a little bigger than their little sister. She instinctively held him as he hit a bump on occasion, squeezing his shoulders. He’d not thought a whole lot about it but Lyla expressed she had to wear a ‘bra’ now. ‘Boobs’ Koji had told him silently in secret. Yea…things were changing.

They came to a stop outside of the dark hole that was Baio. It was the only real store that imported music from all over the world, the others tending to have a small collection of ‘international’ but only what there was a demand for. Someone said it was different in Wasaba but papa…papa said not to ever go there. Shin never got ‘why’, there were times when he still missed it.  
  
Pushing their bikes into the store and setting them near the entry, they wandered over to the ‘grunge’ area. Full blown teenagers were already loitering around, reading CDs and discussing. Koji and Nelly walked in at ease while Shin fought his small sense of trepidation of dealing with older kids. Lyla followed him awkwardly.  
  
Koji flipped through the cassettes, in American alphabetical order, before looking at one in particular. “…Cypress Hill. I think I want to try them.”  
  
“Smashing Pumpkins too” droned Nelly, handing another to Koji.  
  
Lyla’s fears were quelled when Koji handed her _Blood Sugar Sex Magik_. “Oh, but papa wouldn’t like me buying anything that says ‘Sex’.”  
  
“You can just keep it at our house, nee-san” Nelly assured.  
  
‘Nee-san’, Shin thought absently as he picked up _Bleach_ , the real reason they were here. They called her that because she was the older sister they never had. He couldn’t because he was older but imoto…sounded weird.

“Hey, kiddos! Picking up our weekly music adventure, I see?” gushed the guy behind the counter. He was pretty young. Gustafa or something odd.

They all nodded, pushing the cassettes onto the counter. Gustafa started bagging them, punching numbers on the register, “You guys should consider a CD player in the future. These cassettes go all zonky quick.”  
  
Shin had noticed that, that they would unravel for literally no reason. Maybe they could request a CD player for _next_ Christmas. Thanking Gustafa and taking their leave, Koji suggested they get some milkshakes on their way home. Shin always got the chocolate flavor in a large despite the cross looks the owner gave him. Lyla didn’t want her own but…she did want _some_ so he always got enough to share his with her.

Trudging up their driveway, he put up the kickstand on his bike and helped Lyla off, the other two running into the mansion to listen to their new music. Usually they’d listen separately then convene to bring what they thought were the best songs like some great musical summit. Lyla sighed as they went to his room, plopping down on his bed and drinking the milkshake. “…It does sound like fun, Shin.”  
  
“What does?” he replied, taking the plastic off the cassette.  
  
“The concert. I think I would like to go but I couldn’t.”  
  
Shin frowned, taking the cup as she handed it to him for his turn, “Well, I mean, the lying part isn’t great but your dad already doesn’t know about some things we do—like go to the music store. It’s not like we’ll do it _that_ much.”  
  
“Oh, I’m not too worried about that” she assured, turning onto her back, “But do you see the way they dress?”  
  
Raising a brow, he smirked some. “Mama is the fashion one, Lyla.”  
  
“Oh pooh, Shin! It’s not the way _I_ dress. I dress like a frumpy old maid!”  
  
Ah…the grunge fashion he had noted was pretty synonymous with the name: it was…grungy. Very dark, very layered, very…grungy. A whole lot of flannel. The girls were very complicated too but he had also noticed the skirts and dresses were _far_ above the allowed ankle length of Okamoto Bajiru. He scowled thoughtfully, “…I dunno. I’ll ask dad first and maybe you can dress up different for the concert. If we can go.”  
  
She nodded and they listened to Nirvana’s first album, sharing the milkshake. Lyla would occasionally play with his longer hair, teasing him about how pretty and silky it was. Someone at school told him that ‘gaijin shouldn’t have hair that straight’.

Shin recollected that he didn’t even care to know what that meant. That was kind of the problem with him, Koji, and Nelly: comments on their ‘foreignness’ got thrown around a lot and they weren’t troubled. Nelly actually mentioned it very in passing to their dad and that was probably the second, or maybe third if he was stretching, time he saw his father incensed. They didn’t get it. They thought the mixed heritage thing was kind of cool but Yagami Yamada advised that people meant it meanly, that they didn’t think it was ‘cool’ at all.

People like Okamoto Bajiru who called them half-breeds.

“Lyla” he murmured, closing his eyes as she braided strings of his hair together before undoing it, her fingers dancing over his scalp, “Do you think we’re half-breeds?”  
  
“What does that mean?” she echoed, confused.

“Well, papa is half-American. I’m not pure Japanese.”

She pouted, “I was just saying your hair was _pretty_ , Shin, not making fun of you about anything like that.”  
  
“I know—but still.”  
  
Lyla fell quiet. He didn’t know it then but her father was the abusive prick that told her she was a slut when her shirt slid off her shoulder or that he only married ‘mutated freaks’ because of the stature of the dead relatives her mom had. She’d sneak over to his house a lot then at night and to this day he wondered about that.

She hugged his shoulders, whispering, “I’ve never thought anything but how wonderful your family is, Shin. I really envy you. If I think _anything_ about your ‘Americanness’, it’s that you and your papa have the absolute most perfect eyes.”  
  
“Not by choice…”  
  
“No. But they’re yours.”  
  
He supposed with age that Shin and his brothers _grew_ to have a problem with the comments. The offhand remarks from their peers didn’t last considering the twins had a violent streak a mile long. If they said it anymore, they said it behind closed doors like Lyla’s father did. Had Lyla said ‘yes’ that day, that she did, things would have become different between them.

Though…things were different between them regardless, he realized.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Yagami Shin had walked down the stairs late in the night, having gone to get a glass of milk before bed. There was a light on in the living room and he wondered if one of the kids had accidentally left it on. Peeking into the room, instead, he’d found Yagami Yamada and Dana curled up together on the couch.

His mother was ‘purely’ Japanese so he figured if she wasn’t offended by their father, why was Lyla’s dad? Their mother was a little tough on their papa, Shin felt, but that didn’t mean one bit she didn’t praise and adore him. It was a little nauseating. The man in question looked up and smiled. “Hey, son. What are you doing up?”  
  
“I just wanted some milk…”  
  
“Don’t forget to brush your teeth after.”  
  
“I won’t” he made a face. Dad was always a doctor, even when he was off. “Papa?”  
  
“Hmm?”  
  
Shin hesitantly came in a bit further, uncertain if this was even appropriate to ask a parent but feeling the worst thing his father could say was ‘no’. “U-Um, the band Koji, Nerimaru, and I like are coming in a few weeks to Tokyo and w-we would really like to see them in concert. Can we?”  
  
His mama looked up, blinking languidly, “You mean ‘Nirvana’?”  
  
“Y-Yes.”  
  
Yamada had made a bit of a face. Later in life, his father admitted that he did ‘like them’ to some extent but the group wasn’t exactly his ‘aging cup of tea’. “Um, I…I guess? I mean, I…I suppose I need to go with you guys.”  
  
“I know papa is busy--”  
  
“No, no” Yamada interjected, “I know you boys are getting to that age. I remember it myself. I’m glad you asked, at least…”

Eh? Dana smirked at him knowingly as Yamada cleared his throat, “Anyway, sure. It’s just you and your brothers?”  
  
Shin came and sat on the ottoman nearby, frowning, “Well, Lyla wants to come but she’s embarrassed about her clothes. She said that she dresses like a ‘frumpy old maid’ and that she’d stick out too much.”  
  
His mother was from an even older version of what Lyla was in presently. She had to dress a certain way and behave a certain way to meet rich societal standards. Shin remembered how his mama’s eyes narrowed at the reminder, apparently aware of Lyla’s austere rules and how she, now the fashion queen, had to once live them herself. “Tell the poor dear not to worry about that. I’ll get her something.”  
  
“O-Oh, okay. I’ll tell her then. Thank you, mama, papa.”  
  
They both kissed his forehead, bidding him goodnight. He gleefully rushed up the steps and went to Koji’s room, knocking on the door. “Come in?”  
  
Entering, Shin gushed in a whisper, “Mom and dad said we can go.”  
  
Koji’s eyes widened, sitting up in bed, “Really?? That’s awesome!”  
  
“Don’t tell Nelly until tomorrow, he’d be too wound up tonight” Shin warned.

“Lyla too?”  
  
He nodded and Koji seemed pleased with this. “She’s totally gonna be your wife one day, Shin.”  
  
“Don’t be crazy, Koji” Shin scoffed, “Just because you found _your_ ‘wife’--”  
  
“They’re cousins, you know?”  
  
Shin’s brow rose, confused, “What now?”  
  
“Lyla and Popuri—the girl I promised to marry. They’re cousins.”  
  
What? Shin wandered to sit on the bed, confused, “How do you figure? Because they both have pink hair?”  
  
Koji shook his head to the negative, scooting closer, “Lyla told me about her mama—her mama’s mama was married to this rich guy, right? Lyla’s grandpa. He died in an accident when Lyla’s mama was a baby and her mom remarried and had Popuri’s mama. They apparently don’t talk at all and Lyla said she’s not really even met Popuri before—she didn’t even know her name! Crazy, right?”  
  
“Very crazy” Shin echoed, “…That doesn’t mean _I’ll_ marry Lyla though, Koji.”  
  
“They’re gonna force nee-san to marry someone, Shin, just like they forced our mama” Koji glowered, “We can’t let that happen to her.”  
  
…Oh yea. She…she did say her papa didn’t believe in ‘blending genders’ until an arranged marriage was in place. Did…did that mean that, one day, he’d never get to speak to her again? Her dad would probably pick someone evil, just like Domo, their ‘stepfather’, and…

…What would he do to Lyla? This mystery figure not in existence yet. Shin…wasn’t sure he wanted to marry Lyla, his best friend of six years now.

Just he’d known even before the moment everything changed entirely that he’d never let her get hurt, whatever it took.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Yagami Shin sighed as he rolled the sleeves up on the red flannel shirt he’d secured, certain that was all the ‘grunge’ wear he would be allowed to don as the son of Yagada, the name of their mother’s fashion company and also the woman’s alias. Koji got a dark gray one to wear over a black t-shirt while Nelly simply wore a red shirt with jeans. Their dad had smiled some when they all broke out the Converses. Shin did recall his father wore them too, once upon a time.

It was so exciting leading up to today. They had been planning outfits and discussing where they might go to stand if it were allowed. Their father very reluctantly conceded to not come into the actual concert, stating he’d sit nearby and read. It seemed boring but even Shin didn’t exactly want the man hovering over them. Now that it was the day of, Shin was splitting at the seams and ready to go. Just one more person though.

His mother had decided to make what Lyla was going to wear. Shin couldn’t remember if he’d ever seen his mother make _casual_ clothes but the woman assured that was where she started. Lyla was a bit nervous but he could tell by the twinkle in her eye she also couldn’t wait. It…was going to be different to see her not in blouses or long dresses or skirts. It wouldn’t make much of a difference, he had figured. She was Lyla at the end of the day, not matter what she wore.

“God, the whole style goes against everything I stand for!”  
  
Shin looked up from where they were waiting in the kitchen, startled by his mother’s exclamation as she came down the steps. She looked _slightly_ aggravated. Yamada frowned, fixing himself a cup of coffee. “What’s wrong, dear?”  
  
“‘Grunge’” she huffed, “The whole aesthetic is ‘I don’t care how I look’! You can wear flannel a-and _floral_ together!!”

Oh dear. “So…you didn’t make Lyla an outfit” Koji replied.

“Of course I did. She’s a little shy though.”  
  
Eh? Shin pouted, “Mama, you made something she’s not comfortable in?”  
  
“No, Shin…I guess I’m just afraid the wrong person will see me.”  
  
They all looked up as Lyla’s voice came from somewhere. It sounded like she was clunking down the steps. She always wore really dainty shoes so it sounded like she was having a hard time picking up her feet. Nelly stood up straighter and Koji crossed his arms. They were probably going to make her nervous too, staring like this! About to tell them to ‘calm down’, she finally entered and…he also found himself staring.

She was wearing a yellow floral dress that was above her knees and opaque dark pantyhose. Her hair was down as usual but a black pork pie hat sat at a tilt on the back of her head. And…she was wearing the iconic military boots of the style. She smiled wearily. “Because if one of papa’s business partners sees me…”  
  
Dana scoffed. “Don’t you worry about that, dear. We don’t dress to appease the masses.”

“Yea! You look awesome, nee-san” gushed Koji.

Nelly agreed and Lyla thanked them. Shin didn’t know what to say. She was cute. She was always cute though. Right. “I-I wouldn’t worry about them either, Lyla. I doubt the type of people your dad hangs out with would be there anyway.”  
  
Lyla nodded, “You’re right, this wouldn’t be their cup of tea.”  
  
Their dad smiled, having poured his coffee into a disposable cup. “All right, let’s get you guys there so you can get good seating. Shin, you have the walky talky in case of emergency?”  
  
Shin took the clunky thing from his deep pocket and nodded. Dana clapped her hands together, “Oh, my babies are going to their first concert! Here, let me take a picture before you go.”  
  
Lyla seemed horrified by the thought. Really, now that Shin thought about it, he wasn’t sure he had any pictures with her. They coaxed her into the Polaroid picture and she stood stiffly beside him. Their mother showed it to them and Lyla seemed surprised. “O-Oh, it looks good.”  
  
“Yep!” Nelly proclaimed.  
  
The twins ran toward the door, excited, and Shin started behind them. In the back, he heard Lyla ask if there was a way to make a copy of the picture.

…Maybe he’d buy a new camera too so he could take pictures of them when they were out. To make up for lost time anyway.

They climbed into their dad’s vehicle, Shin sitting in the back with Lyla and Koji while Nelly rode shotgun. Yamada pulled down the long driveway, sipping his drink, before groaning. “…Okay. So, uh, rules?”  
  
“Rules?” Koji droned in dismay.

“Yes, _rules_. No talking to strangers, no accepting…any beverages or other questionable things from people, and you stay together.”  
  
Seemed manageable enough though Shin knew his brothers were too excitable to _not_ move around and he was not going to be doing that unless Lyla did. He had…side-discussed with the two that they meet up at whatever entrance they came through if they got separated.

Lyla, despite agreeing that it’d be insane that her father’s cohorts would be here, looked around shakily when they exited the vehicle. No, they should be good. Shin smirked as their papa wandered behind them and people stared at the very tall man. No, their dad would draw more attention than her… they’d be good.

“Okay, you all, have fun. And just call me on the walky talky if anything goes wrong” Yamada warned.

“Fine, fine, dad” Nerimaru droned.

The man looked up at the Nakano Sunplaza, his brows raised before he nodded once as if he’d reached some firm resolution. “…I’m going to go have a meal here. I’ll be in the restaurant when you’re ready.”  
  
Hmm? “Okay, papa.”  
  
So the four of them proceeded into the concert hall, Lyla huddling close to them. He felt…strange about it but he nervously grazed his hand over her palm. He blushed, thankful the lights were already down as she gingerly grasped it. Okay. Just lucky Koji and Nelly were way ahead of them and not noticing…but it didn’t mean anything. He just wanted her to feel safe.  
  
They fit right in though there were a few more business men than he expected. They _may_ have been amongst the youngest here and he wondered if they were supposed to even be allowed in here. All the same, they’d probably have to wrestle him from the arena. He…felt the energy. It was a little tame?

Their father informed them that Japanese concerts, the fans listened ‘politely’ so they weren’t most likely going to jump around or scream a whole lot. The energy was going to be different than some of the concert videos they’d gotten of European and American concerts. Shin could already tell though there were some rowdy people present. They were definitely in the minority. Lyla looked around after they got to their seats, blinking. “…I guess it might take them a moment to prepare?”

Looking at his watch, he frowned, “We’re a little early…maybe fifteen more minutes?”

He heard that American bands weren’t the most punctual, however, so he was expecting them to be a little late. However, only some minutes after the suggested time, in what had to be peak grunge that would make his mother balk, Kurt Cobain emerged in striped pajamas, greeting them ‘good morning’ in English, despite it being almost seven o’clock at night.

Lyla squealed, delighted. It…did feel surreal, being in the presence of this person they only listened to. Koji and Nelly would never be _anything_ but rambunctious, completely excited as the band started in on Negative Creep. He guessed he…felt he had to fall into the politeness and listen.

_“I’m so happy because today I’ve found my friends: they’re in my head. I’m so ugly but that’s okay ‘cause so are you: we’ve broken our mirrors. Sunday morning is everyday for all I care and I’m not scared. Light my candles in a daze ‘cause I’ve found God. Hey, hey, hey.”_

Shin’s brows furrowed, Lyla singing softly beside him. He had sang the lyric at least a couple times but…that seemed like a weird thing to think.

 _“I like it, I'm not gonna crack. I miss you, I'm not gonna crack. I love you, I'm not gonna crack. I killed you, I'm not gonna crack.”  
  
_What did that _mean_ exactly?  
  
Shin smirked, confused, as Dave Grohl told Kurt a story about how he was sick with the flu and that someone gave him an elixir of ‘cow sperm’ and ‘lizard penis scrapings’. Uh, what? Granted, it sounded pretty haughty of him and maybe he wasn’t giving this crowd that much credit, but he wondered if the rest of the crowd understood what he said as they cheered. Lyla asked him to translate to make sure she got it and she squeaked, flustering in embarrassment. Yea…  
  
He noticed Lyla was still holding his hand when _Smells Like Teen Spirit_ started to play at the end of the show, generally everyone getting more excited about that one. Lyla hopped a bit more, singing just a bit more. Shin smiled. She was cute, wasn’t she?

_“Break the noose, kill your parents…! Don't take any of the security guard shit! Kill them, kill the security guards. Kill all security guards!”  
  
_Shin stared, alarmed by the sudden declaration. It…sounded like it may have come from Kurt? What the heck? Lyla was nonplussed for _some reason_ as were the twins. When Koji and Nelly reemerged, completely _psyched_ and ready to see them again, Shin nodded in vivid agreement. It was…everything. Just little bits of it kind of bugged him. “What…do you guys think that last part meant though?”  
  
“I dunno, maybe they’ve cracked” Nelly shrugged, scowling as they were basically carried by the crowd toward the exit.  
  
Maybe. Lyla giggled, “That was a lot of fun. I’m glad we got to see them. When they come back, let’s do it again, okay?”  
  
“Of course” Nelly grinned.  
  
Next time. Shin was in full agreement. “We…we should see a lot of different people while we have the chance.”  
  
Lyla frowned at him, her hand still, after everything, in his, “What do you mean?”  
  
“Well…you just never know, right?”  
  
“Too deep, nii-san” Nelly droned.  
  
Shin leered at him but Koji didn’t say anything for or against the sentiment. He didn’t say anything either when he was the sole one of the twin duo to notice Lyla and him holding hands. Koji and he processed things a little differently than the others, Shin realized later in life. There were inconsistencies in the way people acted and sometimes it raised question. Not to everyone though. Just…to people like them.

Their papa smiled when they came out, talking all over themselves about the experience. “I’m glad you all enjoyed yourselves. I remember that feeling…it means a lot.”  
  
Hmm? The man told them to pose for their ‘after’ pictures and Lyla was much more comfortable. Shin asked that she take a picture by herself because he was pretty sure they didn’t have one picture of her. She was shy again but still managed to look chipper. That…was the thing about Lyla though. For all the things he recognized in other people, he never a hundred percent recognized the hole she felt she was in. She smiled at him when they got in the car, musing that maybe his mom could be hired out to make dresses like this one… but longer.

“Which song did you like the most, ‘nee-san?” Koji asked.  
  
“I always kind of liked Been a Son.”

Shin stared at her as Nelly interjected with ‘On a Plain’, the trio avidly discussing it and musing over their next outing already.

_She should have stayed away from friends. She should have had more time to spend. She should have died when she was born. She should have worn the crown of thorns. She should have been a son._

…What was it about people that made him wonder?

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

April 5th, 1994.

Yagami Shin couldn’t rightfully say what it was exactly about celebrities. They weren’t family members, they weren’t friends, they couldn’t even be classified as acquaintances. He often found people that didn’t understand why they got embraced as such, why…why things they did mattered. Maybe it didn’t. Just those people created something that formed a place in follower’s souls, be it a movie, be it a show, or…be it a song. Music especially cradled its way into his spirit and…and the creator came with it.

They were ahead in Japan, it was already the sixth by the time Shin heard over the radio: Kurt Cobain committed suicide.

Suicide. As in, Kurt Cobain felt the need to take his own life. From himself. He just…didn’t feel a need to exist anymore. That’s it. Nothing left.  
  
Sitting on their broad porch, Shin folded his hands together and stared out into the setting sun. What…on Earth would make someone reach that point? He…he understood things about Koji that made that a concern but to seemingly have everything and just…blow off your own head?

It must mean…he didn’t have everything. Or something…had been very muddied in his life.

Koji and Nelly had been sitting outside with him earlier as well, silent. Koji had said softly, _“I guess there was always something wrong. I just…thought he was able to center that somewhere else. Dad always says…center your negative energy.”  
  
“Nirvana” _Nelly had whispered.  
  
Nirvana. To extinguish ‘hate, passion, and delusion’. Koji snorted darkly, _“…Yea, I guess death is one way to get that.”_

_“It’s not that easy”_ Shin had snarled.

_“It shouldn’t be.”  
  
_The most delusional thought he’d ever heard in times like these, when you mourned someone that you never knew, was that you could have saved them. Shin had always been able to distance himself from that part. This once, however, though he didn’t think he could have saved him, he had to wonder…was there something he could have done?  
  
Could he have written a letter? Could he have cheered a little harder? Could he have…fully realized that he was suffering?  
  
“Son?”  
  
Shin looked up, fourteen years in and hurt, as his father appeared. The man looked weary and confused. “What’s got you out here? What’s the matter?”  
  
“…Kurt Cobain—the guy from Nirvana—he killed himself, dad.”  
  
Yamada grimaced and sighed. Taking a seat beside him, the man patted his back. “It’s tough, isn’t it? I’m sorry.”  
  


“I just don’t get it, dad. He had a wife and kid and music—its all gone now for him” Shin whispered.  
  
His father was quiet for a moment before shaking his head, “You can have everything, son, but as long as you don’t have peace of mind, none of that matters. If you’re not enough for yourself, nothing on this Earth can keep you here.”  
  
His eyes widened, looking to his father in confusion. It sounded…like he knew. “…Have you ever felt like that, dad?”  
  
“Mm. Everyone is different, son. Everyone has a different path to follow and everyone has a different interpretation of their situation. I…I had a different set of circumstances after you all came into my life.”  
  
…Right. Hugging his knees, he hissed. “…I want to save people, papa. I don’t want to feel this helpless again.”  
  
“…I know exactly how that sentiment feels, Shin. That’s one of the reasons I was able to keep going and become a doctor.”  
  
Made sense. Shin wasn’t sure he…could do that though. “Papa, I…I know you probably would like me to become a doctor but I don’t…don’t think I have it in me.”  
  
“Nonsense” Yamada scoffed, “You can certainly be a doctor if that’s what you want and endeavor to be. I started from absolutely no foundation, Shin, you know that.”  
  
“I know, dad. You’ve…you’ve done a lot of impressive things. And you’ve helped a lot of people. So-So I guess that’s what I’ll do: I’ll be a doctor” Shin whispered.

It was such a big deal to his father when he said that. Shin couldn’t even put into words the memory of his father as the man looked just downright _delighted._ “I’m proud of you, son. I’ll see if I can get you into some of the junior groups at the hospital so you can get a feel.”  
  
Shin just nodded numbly. Yamada rose to his feet and patted his head, “Don’t be out here too long. I promise, it…it hurts right now but it’ll pass.”  
  


…For him it would. Not Kurt.

“S-Shin?”  
  
Maybe ten minutes after his father left, he looked up to find Lyla wandering from the side, probably having cut through their secret passage. Her green eyes were red with tears and she looked visibly shaken. Shin sighed and held out an arm to her, “So you heard.”  
  
Sniveling, she hugged his arm and he patted her shoulder. “I-I don’t get it, Shin. I-It’s been a while but we once saw him _alive_! He was alive and now he’s gone an-and taken his life!”  
  
“I know. It’s a shaky feeling” he murmured.

He blushed when she held his hand, sitting quietly in the Spring night. Ever since the concert, sometimes she would hold his hand at random. Luckily it was only observed by Koji, at most. ‘Luckily’ was still odd because Koji hadn’t said a word and that was pretty out of character. He supposed…he’d never not held back.  
  
“…I’ll save people, Lyla. I’m going to be a doctor, just like my dad.”  
  
Her eyes were wide as she looked up at him. Kind of like how his favorite musician just killed them self, he…didn’t really understand the hope that comment had cast into her and his father’s eyes. “Really?”  
  
“…Yea.”  
  
“Th-that’s great, Shin! You’re so kind and sweet, I bet you’ll be a great doctor.”  
  
Really? He sat here now and wondered sometimes. Maybe he could have. He’d certainly had to treat a lot of wounds in his lifetime. ‘Kind and sweet’ though? Maybe once upon a time.  
  
After some years, when things such as memorandum became more available, Shin had the opportunity to read the suicide letter Kurt Cobain wrote. The strange part was his handwriting changed midway and the entire tone shifted when it did. Koji had his skepticisms and Nelly admitted he had to wonder. Shin often thought that perhaps Kurt had to speed through his processes. Koji cryptically suggested that when the penmanship changed, maybe someone else took over Kurt’s essence. The idea toyed with Shin some nights, the idea that another soul decided it should be over. Perhaps because sometimes it felt like there was something else present if he thought about it too long, about everything that had happened that he had and continued to have to face.  
  
The last line before Kurt Cobain parted with ‘peace’ declared it would be ‘better to burn out than to fade away’. Once the passion was gone. Yagami Shin would never call what he had had to do in his life ‘passion’. It was necessary. He had meant it when he said he had to save people.

…He supposed, just like Kurt Cobain, he just hadn’t suspected that he would have to give up so much of himself to answer that calling.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

  
“Dinner time!”  
  
Yagami Shin dished out bowls of rice and miso but set the pickled vegetables and gyudon in a large bowl. While he knew from Lyla’s house that the proper way would be to have everyone’s individual serving set, that doubled the amount of dishes they had to do and, well, he wasn’t a big fan of that task and neither were his siblings. They agreed they could be ‘untraditional’ to save time.  
  
Ten-year-old Jill and Tony came down first, nine-year-old Shaun behind them. He leered slightly as the other two took their sweet time meandering down the steps…only to find the ‘other two’ were Koji and _Lyla._ “Where is Nelly?”  
  
“On the phone with his girlfriend” Koji yawned, taking a seat.

Of course. Rolling his eyes, he settled down at the chair he usually occupied, near the head of the table. Lyla sat and started passing the main dishes, gushing, “It looks yummy, Shin.”  
  
“Thank you” he smiled, pouring himself a glass of water from the pitcher.  
  
“Nii-sans!” Shaun suddenly pouted, sitting next to Tony, “I need my uniform for kendo washed!”  
  
“Oi, oi, wash your own uniform, punk” Koji scolded.  
  
Shin smirked. “Koji, he literally flooded the laundry room last time. Mom had a fit.”  
  
“Yea, because he was trying to get out of doing it ever!”

Shaun grumbled petulantly, Shin able to make out, ‘and it would’a worked if it wasn’t for your big mouth’. Koji’s eyes narrowed, “What was that now, brat?”  
  
“Shaun, we all have responsibilities in the house” Shin expressed, picking up his chopsticks to dish his portion onto his plate, “Doing it wrong on _purpose_ just means we’re going to be having you do it until you get it _right_. You know we pull our weight around here.”  
  
“Bleh. I wish we were like nee-san’s house and had people do all our chores for us” Shaun scoffed.  
  
Lyla giggled, “Now Shaun, my house is _way_ less fun than your house.”  
  
He muttered he had his doubts. Shaun was the quintessential ‘baby’ of the family, spoiled rotten and always looking for a way out of chores or any task he didn’t consider desirable. Shin, Nelly, and Koji sat down to discuss it because, up until about a year or two ago, they pretty much let it fly and did his responsibilities for him but there was some concern this was rubbing off on his school behavior.

It sounded weird. Shin nor Nelly or Koji were Shaun’s parents. They were his older siblings and these weren’t things they probably should have been concerning themselves with. Alas, their dad was away doing cardiac training or something and their mom was in Italy for a fashion show. It was becoming more and more like that, where their parents were away for long stretches of time and they had to pick up the pieces. It amazed Lyla. “ _I don’t think my dad would even trust me to do anything like that, even by myself.”_

Shin sipped his water, glancing to his childhood friend. If Bajiru was away for a prolonged amount of time with work, she would break out the clothes she wanted to wear. Today she was wearing a black flowered spaghetti strapped dress that buttoned down the front. It was funny her mom didn’t seem to mind or even report these things back to her husband. When Bajiru was away, they would actually go over to her house like they used to before…well, Shin was deemed ‘unfit’. Lillian was a nice woman but seemed meek and wary. Shin admittedly was not used to this given his mother was fiery and bold. He just…wondered what it was Bajiru did to them.

After about fifteen minutes of them chattering and eating, Nerimaru finally walked down the steps. Shin gave him a look, “Thanks for gracing us with your presence. You did click over if you had to, right?”  
  
“Yea, yea, I know mom would call and cuss me out if I didn’t” he rolled his eyes, sitting at the table next to Koji.

  
“How’s your girlfriend, Nelly?” Lyla questioned, “When do we get to meet her?”  
  
“You’re funny, nee-san. We’re not that serious.”  
  
“Aww, c’mon!”  
  
Wiping his lips, Shin sighed. The twins were well liked in their last year of junior high and he knew the second they stepped into high school, it was a wrap. Koji was still a bit more reserved, surprisingly devoted to the girl he met four years ago. However, Shin couldn’t say he didn’t notice the guy was definitely bringing around some…cheeky magazines lately. Nelly was in ‘experimentation’ mode too.

Him? He…dabbled. Girls approached him and generally he thought he let them down gently but, on the rare occasion, he might have conversed or talked to them. While Koji didn’t get into Nelly’s business over it, he sure got into _Shin’s._ “ _Don’t be sneaking around just because nee-san doesn’t go to the same school as you._ ”

Dummy. Shin advised that he and Lyla were friends. That was it. Best friends. Koji wasn’t matchmaking them. _“Oh yea? Ask her then.”  
  
_…Admittedly, that scared the hell out of Shin. He wouldn’t even know what to _say_ if Lyla said she considered them more than friends. He just knew he surely would feel obligated. It wasn’t as if he were against her or anything. He thought she was amazingly cute and comfortable to be around after all this time. Just…

He was a half-breed to her father.

Five years later and he still remembered that taste of vitriol and hatred from her father. Lyla had only ever treated him well since he’d known her but there was no way her dad would approve.

Koji and Nelly cleaned up the dishes after ascertaining whether the kids were done with their homework. _That_ was a daily battle with all three of the youngest as they moaned and belly-ached about the task. Koji scolded them and commanded they bring their work to the table so they could supervise. For as fun-loving as either of the twins were, they were pretty stern about school. Shin felt he wasn’t closet level genius like their dad but he knew he wanted to do his best.

…Lately, he’d looked at all it would take to be a doctor, all he would be required to know and to say it was daunting was an understatement. His dad was pressing it though, insisting that he could do anything he set his mind to. Perhaps.

Shin sleepily settled on the couch with Lyla after all the chores were done. He could definitely stand to go to bed but it felt so geezerly to go to sleep at ten at night. Koji and Nelly had at least another two hours in them even having done chores. Lyla curled into his side, throwing a blanket over their laps, and essentially cuddled with him…

That…was the other problem. Lyla was going to treat him very casually and, frankly, he was going to do the same. They’d known each other for almost ten years, they were comfortable with one another. But the girls at school that _did_ know of Lyla demanded to know what the deal was. He insisted they were friends but they didn’t like that. Never was he going to abandon Lyla for someone else’s insecurities but…

If Bajiru _did_ make her marry some random man…?

“Mm, Lyla, I think I’m going to bed” Shin murmured after an hour, having been falling asleep while they watched a television drama she liked.  
  


“Oh, okay. Good night” she smiled at him.  
  
He scowled a bit, sitting up, “…I mean, let me walk you home, of course. I know you’re only a few footsteps away but I’d feel better about it.”  
  
“I’ll just go through our secret path. No one’s back there.”

Shin groaned, just slumping back into his original spot. “…I’ll just wait for your show to finish.”  
  
“You’re being overprotective, Shin” she said gravely.  
  
Was he? He supposed. When they were far younger she would sneak over here by herself in the dead of night and he wasn’t concerned then. Oh yea. “Why don’t you just sleepover like we did when we were kids? I’ll get you a nightshirt.”  
  
Lyla looked _horrified_. “We’re not kids anymore, Shin! I can’t sleep over now.”  
  
“Why not?” he pouted, “Have we done something wrong?”

This seemed to have startled her. “W-Well, no, of course not! Y-You all are like my family--”  
  
She paused. “…I guess you’re right. I shouldn’t have any problem sleeping over but it’s a little uncomfortable. I have parts now.”  
  
Shin smirked, “Oh?”  
  
“Yep” she nodded firmly, “Big, round, parts.”  
  
“You’re silly, Lyla” he grinned, “I’m sure they’re…impressive parts but I assure you I will not be using any parts or observing any parts.”  
  
She groaned, grabbing the remote from the coffee table and turning the television off, “I guess I am sleepy too. I’ll…I’ll go home for now.”  
  
…What was wrong with staying over? She pet her dress down, sticking out her tongue at him, “I would _consider_ staying over but it’s Friday tomorrow. We have school and I’d have to get up early to get to my uniform.”  
  
Oh yea, that was true. Of course, that was only after hearing things were different now that she was a developing young woman. Did he make her uncomfortable or something? He…he really hoped not.

Going out together from the back deck, they crouched through the vined path and ended up in her back yard. Generally, her housekeepers kept the door open for her because they knew she’d most likely come from that direction. He walked her up to her door and she paused with her hand on the doorknob.

“…Shin.”  
  
“Mm?”  
  
“…I trust you more than anyone, okay? I-I don’t want you to think otherwise, okay?”  
  
Eh? “Of…of course, Lyla.”  
  
She smiled warmly at him, kissing his cheek. “Good night.”  
  
“Good night, Lyla…”  
  
…Weirdly, that was a little uncomfortable. What was going on?

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

So their dad did something a little surprising: he took them on vacation.

That wasn’t to say they didn’t go on small daytrips to the beach when they were younger but, when Shin was about to turn sixteen, his dad accrued enough time to take them all on a week long vacation. The man said somewhat dryly it only took him 25 years to get a legitimate rich people vacation.

Their mother was frantically trying to pack them up, her suitcase massive for a seven day journey under any standards. Koji and Nelly figured that they’d just need a few shirts, shorts, and swimming trunks. Yea, he wasn’t trying to be too fashion forward on vacation…

Yagami Yamada did something else a little startling: he invited not only Lyla but her mother, Lillian.

Bajiru was doing some jungle botany exploration for three months and Lyla had definitely been having a ball wearing what she wanted and coming over to their house when she wanted. She still _generally_ refused to stay over though once Dana assured she could have her own room, she was a little more open. He…guessed it was a little inappropriate for them to sleep together now.  
  
Yamada insisted that they join them though, that they ought to have a little escape too. Lillian was a hundred percent against it, thanking Yamada for the invitation but turning it down. Shin was disappointed but he kind of figured it might have been a little much.

However, the next day, Lillian came back, still reluctant but relaying that they may like to stay for a few days with them. Not the whole week, possibly out of fear that Bajiru would mysteriously reappear and find neither of them there. Well, either way, that was better than nothing and they were thrilled.

Shin groaned, leering at Nelly who was sprawled across Koji _and_ him. It would have been utterly ridiculous for their dad to get seven or eight rooms so they could all sleep individually so he was sharing a room with all of his siblings and sharing a bed with the twins while the youngest three shared the other. While the biggest mercy was not one of them snored, Nelly slept like an absolute jerk. Koji snorted. “ _Why do you think I stopped letting him sleep with me?”  
  
_Heck, Shin would have sworn up and down it was because Koji was over that type of thing. Sort of, the dark fellow explained, adding that their childhood habit of inadvertently cuddling was awkward. Koji assured that if Nelly managed to curl up with him, he’d have held still but Koji said he’d rather die. Also known as he made Shin sleep in the middle and now the asshole was stretched across both of them horizontally. Koji stared at the ceiling, his eyes half-open as Shin pinned him with a look. “You’re gonna have to take the fall tonight, this is ridiculous.”  
  
“I guess I’m not sleeping either way” Koji droned, “I don’t remember him sleeping _this_ crazy.”  
  
Stood to reason he was probably used to having his own bed now. The last time they had to do anything like this was when Shin and his dad lived in Wasaba and the two came to visit. That was twelve years ago.

Sitting up, Shin scratched the back of his head as Shaun woke like the devil was at the door and ran to go ‘pee’. Yea…he sometimes thought about if they had just stayed in Wasaba in the two bedroom apartment. It might be because he was bourgeois now but no, he’d take their life now tenfold before he had to share a room and bathroom with six other people.

  
“Nii-san…” Jill mumbled.  
  
They all looked to her, even Nelly opening his eyes. Shin smiled at her, “Yes, sweetie?”  
  
“I’m hungry. Is it too early?”  
  
It was six in the morning. “Absolutely not, princess. People probably have been up for hours” Koji groaned.

To say that breakfast was nowhere on his mind at 6:04 in the morning was an understatement but when baby sister asked, generally baby sister got. They got up and trekked to the little buffet area downstairs. There were actually a few people already there, one of which being their _father_.

Yagami Yamada was sitting with a cup of coffee and an omelet, reading the paper. What kind of vacation was it for him to keep getting up this early? He looked up and seemed shocked. “Kids?”  
  
“Morning, papa. I was hungry” Jill sighed.  
  
He smiled and kissed her cheek, “My lady can have anything she likes.”  
  
They sat down drearily while the kids ran to order their dishes. Their dad raised a brow, “What time did you lot go to bed?”  
  
“One. We were playing cards” yawned Koji.  
  
Shin nodded miserably while Nelly just went back to sleep. Yamada sighed, “So you planned to sleep until 9 or 10 then start your day?”  
  
More like…twelve. Shin smiled as Jill brought them dishes before she got her own. “You didn’t have to do that, princess…”  
  
She giggled, “Of course, nii-sans! I’ll bring you something to drink too!”  
  
“Such a cute lady” Koji mused sleepily, “If I have to fight twenty guys a day to keep them at bay, I’ll do it.”  
  
Yamada smirked some toward Koji. It wasn’t technically a lie, Koji _often_ got into fights with males that thought to make untoward remarks about Jill as did Nelly. Shin usually didn’t have to but he was more a strong threat sort of guy.

Lyla questioned why they felt it was necessary. _“Your sister is going to be able to have a beau, right?”  
  
_A ‘beau’. Shin rolled his eyes around. He hadn’t been able to give her a direct answer, just that Jill was their precious only sister and _only_ the best was acceptable for her. As was, they thought the same of Lyla too. That had made her laugh. _“You guys do treat me pretty highly.”_

Of course. But…even all this time later, he couldn’t really call her his sister like the others. It just wasn’t quite…that.

It made him a bit queasy but he ate his sister appointed meal and they staggered back to their room. The kids were luckily up and raring to go so Koji and Shin sentenced Nelly to the other bed so they could get some rest. As he’d mentioned, it’d been twelve years since they had to share a sleeping space but Shin couldn’t help notice Koji slept very lightly. Not so much that he was a trigger sleeper but he just…didn’t seem to go in too deep.

It wasn’t something he ought to have told her but he let Lyla in a little bit on what happened to Koji. However, the issue with Koji’s ordeal was even a ‘little bit’ was way too much. She’d been disturbed. _“…Koji’s a sweetie, Shin, but he’s always seemed like he was a little angry underneath it all.”_

Yes, that was also another spot where ‘a little’ wasn’t appropriate; Koji was _very_ angry underneath it all. Somewhat ironically, it was almost never directed toward his family but Koji had a fuse maybe a centimeter long at most. Before Shin went to high school, he found himself having to lure his younger brother out of fights pretty often and a majority of the time it simply did not work. Lyla wasn’t as aware of it because Koji was _fairly_ collected around her but, ho boy, she had not seen the inner workings of her itoto in full action before.

Koji was such an enigma. He was a super observant person and that’s probably why their mother had such a short leash on them giving too much information. Koji only needed a smidge of it to start hunting for answers. Just…Shin wasn’t exactly sure how fair that was. When it happened, after they saved Koji, he’d told Shin when he found Koji wide awake at four am for some reason that sometimes that monster would drag him out of bed at night.

Cringing, Shin buried his head under his pillow to will it away. That was going to be a battle for another time, he supposed. For now, he…just hoped Koji paced himself out of it.

“Shin?”  
  
Maybe four hours later, he forced his eyes open, squinting at whomever called him. Oh. “Lyla…?”  
  
Her blurry form started to focus, wearing a bright yellow sundress that was a bit blinding at this moment. She instantly pouted, “How long are you going to sleep? I want to go to the beach!”  
  
He rubbed his eyes drearily, glancing back at Koji who had turned on his side. Well…he looked a little deeper asleep now. “I guess I’m ready to get up…”  
  
Lyla smiled brightly as he sat up, scratching the back of his head. “It’s so nice out and I want to get in as much time as possible before mama and I leave tomorrow.”  
  
“I agree” he nodded, yawning and stumbling to his feet, “Lemme brush my teeth and get my swimming trunks. You have a bathing suit?”  
  
He made a face when he went into the bathroom. It was a disaster of toothbrushes and combs. Finding his out of the mix, he frowned when no response came. Dabbing toothpaste onto the bristles, he peeked out. Lyla was picking at her dress. Oh jeez. “You don’t have one.”  
  
“It’d be _highly_ inappropriate” she mumbled.  
  
Sounded like something Bajiru would say. “There is nothing ‘highly inappropriate’ about having an article of clothing to swim in, Lai. Here, we’ll get you a cheap one from one of the shops on the front. No one has to know.”  
  
She sulked. Yea, that was the problem with the Yagami Clan, they were _all_ about rebellion, even the more conservative of them, considering their dad suggested this specifically when the ‘patriarch’ went away. Of course, going on vacation wasn’t rebellion and just how life was actually supposed to function.

Shin dressed and shook Koji and Nelly to see if they’d be joining them. Nelly was dead to the world but Koji advised he was going to get up in a little while and catch up with them. “Enjoy your time together.”  
  
Always an ulterior motive with that one. They walked side by side, Lyla seeming to silently contemplate if she was actually going to go through with the dreaded task of obtaining a swimsuit. Shin shielded his eyes from the sun as they stepped out of the resort, closing them a bit. “You know I won’t _force_ you, Lyla. I just don’t want that to be the reason you won’t consider it, it being ‘inappropriate’. Your body is _your body_.”  
  
She was quiet when he suggested they stop to get a coconut slushy. As usual, he got the most available to share with her as they walked up the sidewalks. Tons of other teenagers were on the walk, dressed in nothing but shorts and bikinis. Once they finished the beverage, he figured Lyla wasn’t going to bother. She’d started talking about going to see a concert since they haven’t been in a while.  
  
“…Can we go to some really private part of the beach, Shin?”  
  
Looking to her, he frowned, as they continued up the sidewalk. “Of course…why though?”  
  
“I-I don’t want anyone to see me when I get the bathing suit. J-Just you.”  
  
Oh. “O-Oh. Okay.”  
  
Not sure what to make of that, he followed her into one of the shops. She nervously looked through the racks of essentially scraps of cloth formed to make pseudo-clothing. He wasn’t sure if his…support was exactly the most appropriate thing in this circumstance so he looked at some of the knick-knacks they had. He stared at some of the necklaces, wondering if Jill might like one, when he noticed one of the “chokers” that were popular. The concept seemed so uncomfortable. He blinked at one in particular with a black strap and a small golden amulet with some slight engravings and a sapphire in the center. Picking it up, he looked it over. It…might look good on her.

Lyla’s fleeing visage caught his attention out of the corner of his eye. She’d fled into the dressing room like a bat out of hell. Raising a brow, he wandered to the counter and purchased the choker. Well, he figured she found something she at least liked.

When she returned, she was holding the tags and produced them to the cashier. She’d naturally put her dress back on but he figured she was wearing the bikini underneath. Lyla frantically stuffed the receipt into her bag. Shin smirked, patting her back, “It’s not a heist, Lai.”  
  
“It feels like it!”  
  
He chuckled and they trekked down the boardwalk by the beach until the people got sparse. It had to have been about six miles from the resort. Shin stripped off his shirt, setting it on top of the towel he’d brought. Walking to the ocean’s edge, he smiled. One time his dad brought them for a day trip and he was so excited about the water, he almost got swept away when the tide got high. His dad had been such a wreck. His mom, she generally would freak out in the disaster portion but should everything turn out positively, she was relieved and relaxed with the outcome. His dad? He seemed to always get caught up on the ‘what ifs’. Shin was honestly surprised the man was okay letting them wander around freely. God help them if something happened to Jilly.

Lyla strode up beside him shyly. He didn’t want to make a spectacle of it, like this moment was worthy of all amazement. He’d be lying if he said he wasn’t very curious though so he turned to her…and couldn’t help be stunned.  
  
It matched her dress, a light yellow bikini that tied at her neck and a teeny bottom. Lyla was only about 5’2” so she was pretty curvy. Those must be the ‘shapes’ she was talking about. Woah, Shin, no, not cool. “A-Ah, that looks cute, Lyla. I like it. How do you feel about it?”  
  
“…Naked in public” she flushed.  
  
Smiling, he took her hand and pulled her toward the ocean, “You’ll feel way better about it once we’re in the water. C’mon.”  
  
While Lyla was always fearful the wrong person would see her, once she was happy, she was happy, diving under water and splashing him on the way up. She giggled as she surfaced, her chin just above the edge. “It does make more sense to wear something like this for swimming. Clothes get so heavy wet, I’d probably just sink.”  
  
Shin nodded, floating on his back. She pouted at him before pretty much pilediving on top of him. “Oi!”  
  
He snickered, submerging briefly before managing to stand with her in one arm. Lyla looked startled. “A-ah! S-Stop, I’m heavy!”  
  
“Hardly” he snorted, walking toward their stuff, “C’mon, let’s go get lunch and we can come back out here later.”  
  
“O-Oh no, how will I hide this? It’ll get my dress wet” she whispered.  
  
Considering it, Shin figured it was hot enough that he’d be comfortable to walk around shirtless. He gave her his shirt which almost reached her knees. Lyla giggled again, skipping up the sand. “This is turning out to be fun. I wish mama was okay with staying a bit longer.”  
  
“Me too” he agreed, following behind her. “Maybe your dad wouldn’t be too bothered about it, even.”  
  
“That, I doubt.”  
  
He pursed his lips, falling into step beside her. As she had been doing since they were twelve, she held his hand as they walked up the beach. Man, his siblings were probably all over the place and while Koji didn’t say anything about this, the younger crowd? He’d never hear the end of it. But he’d never pull away from Lyla.

“Shin, Nerimaru was telling me something.”  
  
They were sitting together outside of a restaurant, eating dango after having sashimi. Shin sipped his fruit juice as he looked up at Lyla. Her chin was rested in her hands as she gazed at him. “Hmm?”  
  
“Nelly said you have a girlfriend. Do you?”  
  
…That jerk. Shin had started dating a girl in his class named Hime just maybe three days ago. It wasn’t even that serious. “U-Uh, I swear I was going to tell you, honest. S-She just asked three days ago a-and it seemed too early to start putting official names on it yet.”  
  
Lyla pouted, her green eyes narrowing some, “That’s no good, Shin. You have to treat girls special.”  
  
He groaned and she gave him a look, “You treat _me_ special. You should at least do that for someone that you’re gonna marry.”  
  
Hold on now. “I’m going to _what_?”  
  
“If you’re dating her, you’re considering her as a spouse, right?”  
  
Shin was floored. Gawking some, he rapidly shook his head, “N-No! W-We’re _fifteen_!”  
  
Lyla didn’t seem convinced, shaking her dango at him. “Koji said he’s going to marry my cousin and he’s known that since he was _ten_.”  
  
“Koji is _spectacularly_ optimistic on that front. People change” Shin insisted, “She may not want to marry him in the future and vice versa. A lot can change. Like, your friend at school. Didn’t you say she changed when you turned twelve?”  
  
Frowning, she crossed her arms thoughtfully. “…Yea, she changed a lot. And that was only in _three_ years. Ko hasn’t seen my cousin in four…”  
  
“Not to say it _can’t_ happen. My mom met my dad when she was fourteen and they’re still together. But I-I’m not going to treat her passively or anything but, right now, we don’t really have to date to be looking for something permanent. We have time for that.”  
  
Lyla raised a brow at him before rolling her eyes around. “…So you mean to say…dabble?”  
  
“I guess that’s one way of looking at it…I mean, nothing is wrong with getting a look at the landscape, Lai. Get to know different people, get to see different personalities—see what you’re looking for when you do want to start looking for that one person if you want to.”  
  
She didn’t say anything to that, sipping her chai in silence. He…guessed what he was suggesting did sound very flighty and fleeting. He knew Lyla preferred consistency.

“I guess I better stop holding your hand since you have a girlfriend. Or hanging around as much.”  
  
Um. Shin glowered, “You listen, Lyla: under absolutely _no_ circumstances is me having a girlfriend going to be a pass to have someone keep you from being around me or being the same best friends like we’ve always been. If you need someone’s hand to hold, mine will be there when you want it. You mean…you mean so much to me and I won’t allow that to change.”  


Lyla gazed at him rather softly and he didn’t know what to think. Maybe he said too much. Clearing his throat, he reached into his bag. “A-Anyway, I got you something. I know you’ve wanted one. I hope you like it.”  
  
She gasped softly at the choker, running her finger over the jewel. “Oh, it’s so pretty, Shin. You didn’t have to.”  
  
“I wanted to. I thought it’d suit you” he smiled some.  
  
She bit her lip, reaching behind her neck and putting it on. Yea, it looked good on her. “Thank you, Shin. Y-You mean a lot to me too.”  
  
Hm? Once again she fell quiet, looking out of the window as he finished the last of his dango. He was about to suggest they go catch up with Koji and Nelly who were hopefully up at three in the afternoon now. Lyla never looked directly at him but she murmured: “…You’ll be a doctor, right, Shin?”  
  
…Huh? “…I…I guess that’s the plan right now, Lai. I-I know my dad wants me to. I dunno for a hundred percent yet. I know I still want to help people and that’s probably the best way…”  
  
She gazed at him hopefully and he just did not get it back then. But, just like with Jill, his only baby sister, he wanted the absolute best for Lyla.

And he’d end up failing her.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

When they were in Wasaba, sometimes Shin knew that they weren’t completely well off. He was more aware of it as a toddler when he couldn’t get the things he may have wanted from the supermarket. As he got older, his dad seemed to have a little extra money but had been doing the responsible thing of saving it. It never bothered Shin much though he knew they were somewhat on the skeevy side of town. It had been fine.

Alas, on his sixteenth birthday, he fully recognized they’d become rich kids.

His mom made him his favorite breakfast of omurice and bacon that morning. She gushed, ‘My sweetie plum is sixteen! I can’t believe it!’.

  
He smiled while she gave him kisses on his cheek, continuing to boast of him, before handing him a present. “Aww, mama, you didn’t have to.”  
  
“Of course I did! This is a milestone” she huffed.  
  
Perhaps. Shin set his chopsticks down to rip into the gift, wondering. Oh! “Oh wow, is this the not Nintendo gaming console? PlayStation?”  
  
Koji was munching on a piece of bacon, blinking, “Oh yea. Keiba was telling me that the Final Fantasy on it is awesome. Seven, I think.”  
  
“Still dunno how to feel about using discs for games now though” Nelly droned.  
  
They had just gotten the newest generation of Nintendo, the N64, which used cartridges like everything they’d owned prior. However, time would tell which would turn out better. “This is awesome, mama, thank you.”  
  
“It’s just a starter gift. Your papa is planning something even bigger” she replied, almost like it was a warning.  
  
“Yeesh, I hope my sixteenth birthday is this fancy” Nelly said sarcastically.

Dana tugged his ear, huffing that he better hope he’s not grounded for the rest of his life by then to which Nelly grinned. Koji smirked some, sipping coffee. It was worth mentioning, honestly. The twins were getting pretty heinous with their behavior. He found out Koji and Nelly had picked up smoking somehow. Shin wasn’t even certain how they were _getting_ cigarettes or _why_. It wasn’t anything he ever looked at and thought made any sense. And that wasn’t to mention the wild house parties they started to throw in their parent’s absence. He guessed he was supposed to be the older enforcer but…well, their parents were gone a lot.  
  
He looked at his watch, finishing his toast, before standing. “Well, we better be getting to school, mama. Thank you again.”  
  
“Are you sure you don’t want to take the day off, sweetie plum?” their mom asked, washing dishes.  
  
“That’s okay, I have an exam anyway” Shin replied, smirking when the younger kids rushed past them in a panic to eat breakfast, “I’ll be home early though.”  
  
The great Yagada looked at her watch as well, making a face, “Okay. I’ll probably go to the local shop for a bit to work on some orders but we’ll go out to eat at 7, okay?”  
  
“Sounds good, mama.”  
  
Koji slung his bag over his shoulder, blinking languidly at Dana who leered back at him. “Please don’t get into any fights today. _P_ _lease_.”  
  
“Someone says the wrong shit, they’re getting it.”  
  
She smacked his arm, glowering, “I mean it, young man!”  
  
“Yea, yea.”  
  
Shin sighed as he, Nerimaru, and Koji walked to the door. Really, he had to say it was also pretty ‘heinous’ the things they’d say to Koji to get a reaction. He delivered over a hundred percent too so he was really just answering their provocations. Alas, it was warranted. No one should be saying the crap those bastards said about their sister or mother, especially given the former was just eleven and that was pedophilia at that point.

“Holy shit” Koji said in a startled voice.  
  
Looking up, wondering how Koji picked up language like that _and_ their parents didn’t blink when he used it, Shin froze.  
  
Yagami Yamada popped out of a shiny, brand new 1997 Toyota Supra with a big smile. No…way. Shin gaped as the man walked toward them. “Ah, I was hoping I could surprise you when you got home, son. Happy Birthday, Shin.”  
  
Oh no, ‘holy shit’ was pretty appropriate then. “Dad, there’s _no way_ that’s for me.”  
  
“Well, of course it is!” Yamada insisted, wrapping his arm around Shin’s shoulder, “Even _I_ had someone give me a vehicle at your age, son. I’d be remiss to not get my own son something.”  
  
Nerimaru snorted, “We’re not getting cars.”  
  
Yamada groaned, giving Nelly a look, “This is your _brother’s_ birthday. We’ll address yours next year based on your behavior.”  
  
Koji smirked, “We’re not getting cars.”  
  
Their father groaned again as Shin couldn’t help snicker, rubbing his face, “I-I dunno how to feel about this, dad. Seriously, I know we’ve been here a while but we…came out of Wasaba.”  
  
The man fell quiet so Shin felt he must have said something hurtful. Alas, his father scruffled his hair, “…I do think that a lot too, son. But we made it out. And I can afford to get my kids things and…that’s what I always wanted.”  
  
“…Thank you, dad.”  
  
Yamada gave him a hug, gushing about all the features and giving him the keys. “Okay, you boys get to school, I’ll see you when you get home!”  
  
“S—t, dad even took the day off for your birthday, _favorite_ ” heckled Nelly.  
  
“Um, whatever” Shin scoffed, shocked as he slid into the driver’s seat, “He said if you _behaved_ you’d get a car next year.”  
  
“We’re not getting cars” laughed Koji, getting in the back seat.  
  
Shin couldn’t even account for the feeling as he launched up their long driveway. Heck, they’d even adjusted for the long walk to get to the subway so they’d be hyper early. Technically, he did not have a license since he _just_ turned sixteen today but he figured he could go after his exam. Nelly played with the radio, shocked, “Dude, it has a _CD player_ and a cassette deck! Dad went all out!”  
  
Seriously. He…he felt wrong to even _accept_ this but this seemed to mean something interpersonal to their father. Shin was always aware Yagami Yamada only wanted the absolute best for them but…

Koji stretched across the seat, yawning, and tapping his knee as Nelly managed to find grunge. Surprisingly, grunge was sort of fleeting from existence and making way for some pretty wild stuff, in Shin’s opinion. Koji was particularly fond of one really off-color band. Korn or something…he guessed it was hard to recover from the whole Kurt Cobain situation.  
  
“ _Black hole sun, won’t you come and wash away the rain? Black hole sun, won’t you come? Won’t you come…”_ Shin hummed.  
  
He felt awkward when they pulled into the school. Granted, while some of their classmates came in their own limos, all eyes were on them when he parked. Climbing out with a sigh, he leered as Nelly’s…harem seemed to be able to instantly track his existence. Koji smiled mischievously in his direction, his friends about to come over. “We’re going out after dinner, right? I mean, it is Friday.”  
  
“…I’m not into it like you two miscreants” Shin snorted.  
  
“So? Bring Lyla and show her a good time” Koji sighed.  
  
Uh huh. His brows furrowed and he smirked as Koji started to dance away, Nelly and some of their cronies joining in, as they sang ‘cotton candy, sweetie go, lemme see you Tootsie Roll’. Yea, another thing he wasn’t a hundred percent on was how they were getting into clubs. They weren’t even fifteen for another two months.  
  


Shin went and caught up with some of his friends, few and far between as he was a little less…personable than the other two. They were shocked that he had a car, questioning how he even knew how to drive. Well, that was one thing their dad definitely took time to do: teaching each of them to drive around their huge lot. They were actually _all_ proficient at it except, naturally, Shaun. He was only ten but it was just lucky they didn’t really have trees in the front…

Admittedly, he almost wished he’d taken his mother’s offer because he was completely distracted the whole day. He really didn’t want his parents to think they owed him anything specifically. They kept a really nice house over their head and kept them fed. It…it was a lot when some kids didn’t even have that. And they _always_ kept them up to date with the latest technology as a perk. Getting a whole new console and car in the same day was just a bit insane to him. He was perfectly fine walking and taking the commuter train until he earned it.

…Of course, he’d be lying if one possibility didn’t have him somewhat excited.  
  
He left around two, checking with the twins to see if they did happen to want him to wait for them. Nelly wanted him to but leave it to Koji to know where his brain kind of was. “Nah, go get nee-san.”  
  
Without second guessing, he sped off toward the girl’s school about three miles away. Usually a driver came and picked her up so he couldn’t even really come walk her home. It was a little trivial thing but…  
  
When he got there, the students were just starting to emerge. He pulled up against the curb and looked out for the pink hair. Taking a deep breath, he rolled down the window when he saw her. He had to go about this carefully. “Lai!”  
  
She’d been looking down when she came out of school, holding a few of her books in her arms. She informed him gleefully that they were allowed _one_ accent and she’d never had one but now she did because of him. They wore yellow uniforms with red accents so the choker he got her went perfectly. His eyes closed some as she looked up, appearing startled. Her eyes widened and she walked over. “Shin? Oh my God, what is this?”  
  
“My dad got me a car for my birthday. Crazy, right?”  
  
“Oh, it’s so sporty and pretty!” she gasped, looking it over.  
  
Shin smiled, tilting his head, “C’mon, ride home with me.”  
  
Of course, Lyla grew nervous, looking around for a second…before skipping around and jumping into the passenger seat. “Oh! It’s so fancy!”  
  
“It is” he agreed, easing out into traffic.

He smirked as she played with the radio, gleefully locating songs she liked. _“Have you ever been close to tragedy or been close to folks who have? Have you ever felt a pain so powerful, so heavy you collapse? No. Well, I’ve never had to knock on wood. But I know someone who has, which makes me wonder if I could.”  
  
_Shin raised a brow as Lyla sang along, rolling the window down. “…What does that actually mean though?”  
  
“Hmm? Not sure” she blinked.  
  
…Weird. “So, what are you doing tonight? Think you can come to dinner with us?” he asked.  
  
“I think so! My dinner with papa and mama isn’t until tomorrow. And papa is away so I can probably even stay out later tonight” she gushed.  
  
For the last few weeks, she’d been addressing some dinner with her parents. It wasn’t out of the ordinary that her father had them go to dinner parties with constituents or whatever but she kept kind of talking about it. It would be one thing if she were excited about the event but she seemed pretty passive about it. He kind of wondered what that was about…

  
“Koji and Nelly wanted to go somewhere tonight too, after the family dinner. Sounds like they want to go to a club” he sighed.  
  
Lyla frowned, looking at her house as they pulled in, “…That should be fine too. Papa won’t be back until tomorrow.”  
  
“O-Oh. Okay. Uh-”  
  
She giggled, kissing his cheek, “I’ll see you at 7, birthday boy.”  
  
He smiled some as she skipped out. The servant that she usually rode with appeared to be just about to leave to come get her but she caught them, speaking to them, and…got into the back to go out again? What? Why didn’t she just ask him to stop?  
  
Groaning, he made a circle, went down the long driveway, and drove the several yards home. She was probably going to get him a present, just so the day could be more overwhelming. Figured.

…She wanted to go to the club though? That was very strange for Lyla.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
_Shin remembered he and his family went to a nice Italian restaurant. The twins ordered the steak and he decided on lasagna. Lyla had wanted to ONLY get a tossed salad. He’d said he’d share his lasagna with her, she took a little bite, and suddenly snickered. “Now, why did you do that? I’m ready to eat all of your lasagna.”  
  
He smirked, nodding when the waitress returned with another plate, “Exactly why I ordered two.”  
  
She pouted at him but sure didn’t refuse, eating happily. It was mentioned at some point that her father felt she was too ‘plump’ and, well, Shin couldn’t disagree more.  
  
At dinner, Lyla had worn a long skirt and a blouse, the choker he got her adorning her neck. When they got home and redressed for the club, Lyla remained in the same outfit but had put on a pair of black heels. Okay, he was cool with that, just wearing a silk white dress shirt and jeans with a pair of boots. Koji and Nelly were dressed the same, just black and blue shirts respectively. They hopped into his new car and Lyla requested she sit in the back with Koji…okay._

_It shocked him when she started undressing. Or… ‘undressing’ as she apparently had a dress on underneath. It was a black baby doll dress with no real back of note, just straps holding it up. O…okay._

_She stepped out of his car when he parked and hugged herself, giving that look around she always did out of concern who would see her. He bashfully came beside her and held her hand. It was okay.  
  
Once they got inside, Koji and Nelly were gone, whether by will or design. Shin groaned, already feeling like he didn’t quite get why they were here. They couldn’t drink or anything. Lyla actually gasped when that electronica song, ‘Da Funk’ or something, came on. He chuckled when she asked shyly if they could dance. Okay._

_He was horrified that he was potentially going to be a foot taller than her, already 5’11”. His dad was 6’2” and some inches so if he got THAT tall...however, with the three inch heels, she was a little closer to him. She teased that she couldn’t wear heels everywhere. He smiled. She was always close to him, regardless._

_They danced for hours, getting hot and sweaty. While he wasn’t as in to dancing as his brothers, he kind of enjoyed the energy. Lyla giggled, her usually straight hair curling with the warmth, and asked if they could get something to drink. He agreed wholeheartedly and went to the bar. He felt a little awkward but looked at the non-alcoholic menu, ordering them two virgin pina colada. Seating themselves away from all the activity, Shin sipped heavily before sighing, “…Thanks for coming out tonight, Lai. As you can see, if I had to depend on those two, I’d be all by myself.”  
  
Lyla chuckled, stirring hers with the straw, looking up and beyond him, “Yea, they definitely seem to be enjoying themselves, even the ‘engaged’ one.”  
  
Shin raised a brow but glanced over his shoulder. Koji was currently very, very close to another young woman, whispering. She was touching his shoulder and Shin could almost tell his brother was torn from this distance about how far this was going to go. Must’ve been tough for a pretty hormonal guy…_

_Opening her bag, Lyla shyly handed him a little box. He groaned, “Lyla, I appreciate it but I was literally given a brand new car today. I literally can’t deserve anything else.”  
  
“Don’t be silly” she pouted, rubbing his hand, “You deserve a lot.”  
  
He sighed, taking the box, “I’m sorry, I’m being rude. I know you went right back out to get this for me.”  
  
“Oh, well, I-I already had what I was going to give you but I needed a box” she blushed.  
  
Oh. Shin unwrapped the paper and tilted his head at the white nondescript box. Opening the lid, his eyes widened. Inside was a silver pocket watch with raised designs attached to a chain. He opened it up to look at the face, finding it was in Roman numerals. “I thought it may help with your doctoring. I mean, I remember seeing doctors carrying them around.”  
  
“This…this is nice, Lai, but…it looks like an antique. Is this a family heirloom?”  
  
“Mm” she nodded, “It used to belong to my mom’s dad, my grandfather, and his father before him and his before him. I’m supposed to give it to my husband but I…I would rather give it to you.”  
  
…Eh? His eyes widened as he looked up at her, shocked, “I-I mean, I-I appreciate that, Lyla. But, maybe you’ll…you’ll actually want to do that. Maybe you should keep it until you’re sure.”  
  
Lyla shook her head, “I’m already sure, Shin. I…I don’t want anyone to ever have it except you. You’re the only one that will ever deserve it.”  
  
He flustered, clenching it tightly, “I-I thank you, Lyla.”  
  
“You’re welcome” she smiled, eating the cherry from her drink before gasping, “Oh! Let’s dance to this too!”  
  
“Okay.”  
  
_Yagami Shin sat on the sofa that following Saturday, staring at the watch pensively. ‘This is supposed to be for my husband’ but he was the only one that would ever ‘deserve it’. How? She…she was only fifteen, it wasn’t like she knew her husband wasn’t going to ‘deserve it’. Tapping his toes, he pressed the watch to his lips. Mm.  
  
It was a little after seven when he started on dinner for the munchkins. Koji had said he was going to ‘go off and see something’ really fast but that had been way early this morning. Shin hadn’t seen sight nor sound of him since. Same with Nelly but he had an idea of where that miscreant was: some girl’s bed.  
  
Shaking his head, he was fanning the rice when the doorbell rang. With a frown, Shin wandered up the corridor to answer. Oh, Lyla. She was all smiles, wearing a very simple blue long sleeved, long length dress, her hair pulled back. “Hi, Shin. Oh my gosh, I have something to tell you!”  
  
“Hey. What’s that?” he questioned, returning to the kitchen as she kicked off her shoes. _  
_  
“So my papa has been finding suitors and I have been _dreading_ this meeting for the last month. Just he found someone that is so nice, I’m shocked!”  
  
…Okay. “…Suitors? Lyla, you’re not even sixteen yet.”  
  
“I know” she groaned, sitting at the table, “But papa seems to think it’d be a good idea to get me married between sixteen and eighteen.”  
  
The _hell_? “ _Why_?”  
  
“He says that’s a good marriageable age. That’s when women are the most ‘fertile’ and it’s the age the men he’s around likes.”  
  
Shin glowered darkly, “…Pedophiles?”  
  
Lyla rolled her eyes around, “I guess. It’s legal to get married at sixteen though. And Parsley, the man my papa introduced, he’s only twenty so just barely five years older than me.”  
  
Parsley. “And what does this ‘Parsley’ do?”  
  
“He’s enrolled in college for botany but he actually likes it! And he spoke to me with so much passion about it. It’s just really shocking, Shin. Papa usually doesn’t make happy decisions.”  
  
Pursing his lips, Shin fried tempura, turning it with chopsticks. “…Well, that’s great, Lai. Are you sure he’s the one?”  
  
“‘The one’? That’s a little romantic and fantastical” her nose wrinkled.  
  
He found himself smiling at that, recalling how he thought she was a fairy when he first met her. Lyla was always ‘fantastical’ to him. “Yea, maybe you’re right. Maybe Koji rubbed off on me a little.”  
  
“One true love” she murmured, almost to herself, “…It’s a nice thought.”  
  
Yea. It was just him, Lyla, and the youngest three that ate dinner that night. Nelly and Koji completely failed to show up. After he walked Lyla home, he found himself in the backyard, in their little ‘jungle’. Idly rubbing his hand over a white blossom, Shin gazed off at the moon. Parsley, huh…? Okay.  
  
Walking back toward the front door where he had walked out, he paused, finding Koji standing in the yard with his hands in his pockets. “Dude, where have you been all day?”  
  
Koji didn’t say anything, just kind of looking into the distance. Finally, he shrugged his shoulders and turned to him. For most of their lives, Shin wasn’t always a hundred percent certain what his brother was thinking. Today was no different but he seemed…sad. “Out.”  
  
“Figured that.”  
  
True to Koji form, he didn’t offer any more and started toward the house. Shin cleared his throat, “Parsley.”  
  
His brother stopped and looked back. Shin rubbed his arm, pressing his lips together. “A…suitor Lyla met today. She likes him. His name is Parsley.”  
  
“…I guess fairy tales are bullshit, huh?”  
  
Eh? Koji looked disgruntled now, his brow furrowed as he rubbed the bridge of his nose. However, after a moment, he looked calmer. “…Nah. They’re bullshit for me. Lyla is going to end up different. Fuck Parsley.”  
  
Shin leered as Koji meandered into the house. Lyla seemed really excited about the prospect of this guy. Why was he so damn adamant? Like, Shin was okay with this.

…Okay?

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

End Notes:  
  
First, I am aware that Lyla has purple eyes in Save the Homeland/Hero of Leaf Valley. She’s typically one of those characters that doesn’t open their eyes for some reason so, early on in this series, I adapted that she had green eyes and she has _always_ had green eyes. Then, lo and behold, someone got a screen of her opening them and it’s not even close to green. Well, too bad, they’re staying green.  
  
Second, the setting for the Legacy series is Alternate Universe. It of course is in the Harvest Moon/Story of Seasons/Rune Factory Universe but it’s also _sort of_ in our universe. It’s also a different version of Japan? Like, sort of Americanized Japan, I guess? Not to say Japan doesn’t sound like a neat place in reality but my boys would be banished if some stretches weren’t made.  
  
90s extravaganza! So Duck Hunt is a video game from 1984 that was released on the very original Nintendo. It came with a toy gun and you had to shoot down as many flying ducks as you could. However, should you miss, this dog would come up out of the bushes and snicker at you. You can actually find the dynamic duo of duck and dog in Super Smash Bros now for…some reason.  
  
It doesn’t really matter how old you are, where you shop be it Walmart or Nordstrom, if you’re in the U.S., you’ve seen a Nirvana t-shirt with a smiley face. Nirvana is kind of like…The Beatles in that a lot of people are kind of divisive about them and their music. However, purely historically, they and many other bands kind of bridged into a new sound in music, leaving behind the hair metal and power ballads of the 80s. I personally still really love 90s grunge, it’s like the dourness of my adolescent Emo without hammered metaphors of self-mutilation. But I digress. The lead singer of Nirvana, Kurt Cobain, committed suicide. And Dave Grohl…Dave Grohl is everywhere. “Come As You Are”, “Smells Like Teen Spirit”, “Been a Son”, and “On a Plain” are some of Nirvana’s songs.

Nelly is playing the Gameboy. It was the handheld that first introduced us to Pokemon and saw multiple reiterations, namely the Gameboy Color and Advance. Of course Sonic the Hedgehog is the fast blue hedgehog wearing high top sneakers that for some reason is about to have a live action movie.  
  
Cypress Hill is like a rap/sometimes rock group. Known best for “Insane in the Brain”.  
  
Smashing Pumpkins is similarly grunge royalty…I remember the lead singer used to terrify me as a kid JUST because he was bald and the shape of his head, lol.

Red Hot Chili Peppers…well, there’s almost 40 years of music there so take your pick XP  
  
So I managed to find the concert info on Nirvana’s visit to Japan so that…really bizarre story about the lizard penis potion and killing security apparently happened for some reason?  
  
Lyla’s character design has a choker. Shin is gifting her about the same thing.  
  
Believe it or not, the very first Playstation came out in 1994! It just celebrated 25 years. Shin is getting it about three years late but it sounds like the Yagami Fam is primarily Team Nintendo. Final Fantasy 7 with Cloud, Tifa, Aeris, Sephiroth and the gang came out in 1997.  
  
Koji and Nelly temporarily dance to the 69 Boyz ‘Tootsie Roll’.  
  
‘Da Funk’ is classic Daft Punk, those two techno robot dudes.  
  
See you soon.  
  



	2. Parsley

**Nomad,** Shin’s Story  
 **Chapter 2** : Parsley  
  
 **Author’s Notes:** Hey, ya’ll! I got a short one for you. Well, short for me, I haven’t released a fifteen page chapter in like six years. But the beginning and the end are right where I want them to be.   
  
I don’t think anything crazy is in this one. Language, I guess. If I don’t post another spontaneous chapter between now and next Wednesday, Happy Holidays!

  
Enjoy~  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_This wasn’t for him._

_Yagami Shin plodded along, carrying blankets in the frigid hospital where his father had worked Shin’s whole life. His father got him on some deal to ‘shadow’ and help where he could. So far, Shin had seen simple repairs, x-rays, an ultrasound, and, at the behest of a smoker who wanted him to see the aftermath of smoking, a chemotherapy treatment. It was enlightening and he wished his smoking brothers could see it. Alas…_

_“Boy, you better tell your father you’re not interested in this.”  
  
Shin jumped, startled, as he put the blankets in the closet, fresh from the laundry. Looking over his shoulder, he found his father’s pseudo-mentor, Matsushima Shiro. When Shin was far younger, his father’s main mentor had been Souma Bryant. Souma was a sweet man, he recalled, very optimistic and empowering. Yagami Yamada often mentioned the man as one of his main influence behind Yagami Dana.  
  
However, his father, albeit begrudgingly, if pressed, would admit Matsushima got him to where he was today. Souma laid all the groundwork and opened all the doors but Matsushima made sure he knew exactly what he needed to do behind those doors and kept them open until Yamada could keep them open himself. ‘He’s taught me a great deal and he’s done…he’s done something very monumental for me. He’s a jerk all day but…I can’t deny I’m in debt to him for all time’.  
  
Koji, the all observant, snorted and advised that Matsushima was a ‘big ass softy’ trying to be tough. Probably a product of his age, he had to be ‘manly and gruff’. “I bet he loves kittens.”  
  
It stood to reason that day that Koji was correct, however. Matsushima was very empathetic. And he knew on that day that this? This was not for Shin.  
  
“…It’d break his heart, Matsushima-san. And maybe I just haven’t been observing the right thing just yet!” Shin protested.  
  
“You’ve been here for two weeks, son. I don’t know if it gets any more different than this” Matsushima retorted dryly, tilting his head over his shoulder, “Walk with me.”  
  
Shin had groaned but he followed, Matsushima idly picking up a clipboard as they passed a nurse’s station. “Son, as you may know, I grew up during World War II.”  
  
Which somewhat confused Shin. Matsushima was like…sixty something years old. He did not look sixty something years old, maybe 45 tops. His father had actually questioned it once and Matsushima wryly advised if he told him his secret, he’d have to kill him. But ‘soon enough’, he said mysteriously. What? “Yes sir…”  
  
“I wasn’t old enough to serve at the time but the thought process was the war was going to go on until no one was left. My father pushed the idea of being a military man on me. I went with him once to his base where he was about to fly out and be killed, leaving behind his five children and wife. I knew then, Shin, that that? That was not for me. My skills were not meant for that sphere.”  
  
Shin’s nose wrinkled as they headed up the hallway, “I guess I don’t blame you. You wanted to help people. Military, war, police, they…they don’t always help.”  
  
It was laughable now. His father wasn’t an anarchist or denied the uses of lawful authority but he didn’t trust them, having been born in Wasaba. It had rubbed off a bit on the Yagami children. Matsushima held up his pointer finger, a ‘eureka’ moment if ever. “To the contrary, my boy: that’s what we allow to happen in all spheres of life. We let people whose intentions are not to help or protect or provide overtake these positions. We say ‘well, those cops are corrupt’ or ‘those men are warmongers’ and then write them all off instead of fixing it. We need people in every capacity to protect, to help. We just need to make sure they’re the right people.”  
  
Shin digested that. “Well…it’s hard to be one person doing the right thing.”  
  
“Does that mean we’re not supposed to?”  
  
Eyes widening, he looked to Matsushima. The man stuffed his hands into the pockets of his white lab coat, drawling, “My country was on a mission to conquer, Shin. That’s not what I believe in and that’s why I wasn’t a military man. But that doesn’t mean that people aren’t being violated and killed for their own personal rights and need people to protect them. Have you heard about the Sech’s Initiative? And keep your mind out of the gutter.”  
  
Shin frowned, racking his brain on why that sounded familiar… “Um, I think I heard about it on the news. It’s somewhere in the Middle East, I believe.”  
  
“Correct. While of course countries like America are all over the place over there for their precious oil, they’re overlooking other atrocities. The Sech’s Initiative is designed to eradicate the Terrans, another group of people that they view as ‘inferior’ for some reason or the other, nothing valid. Their leader has taken a page from Nazi Germany and is creating camps in the desert to wipe these people out. They promise war for anyone that tries to stop them…but are we not supposed to?”  
  
Oh. Hesitant, Shin glanced around. His father…wasn’t very militant. Alas… “Well, no. I-I mean, I don’t know how much I believe we’re supposed to just bust into other people’s business but if those people don’t have the means to protect themselves, I-I feel we need to help. That’s…that’s one reason why I said I wanted to be a doctor to my dad. I want to help people.”  
  
_

_Someone called Matsushima in the distance, probably a nurse seeking his assistance. He sighed, “…I think your father would disapprove of anything like the military or the police, Shin, and for honestly good reasons. But those ‘good reasons’ are why we need good people. The cops? The military? They exist under the mask of good intentions. Just too few people have a sincere face and the people that do aren’t ready to come against those in power that don’t.”  
  
Shin frowned as he walked away, “I see you around here, son, and this isn’t what you mean when you say you want to help people. That’s for people like your father and I. Don’t shorten your domain for him.”  
  
…A mask, huh? Biting his lip, he wandered away to find another task. He could at least finish out the term his father requested._

_Matsushima was right though: this…this wasn’t how he was going to help people.  
  
_ XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _“Shin! I want you to meet Parsley_!”  
  
That was the first solid time that Yagami Shin thought maybe his brother was onto something. The truth of the matter was, when his best friend Okamoto Lyla said that, he immediately thought he’d rather jump into a vat of lava.

Over the months following Lyla meeting this ‘suitor’, they started seeing less of each other. She attended dinner with Parsley or would go to seminars with him. Sure, she still came over pretty often, it just wasn’t to the degree Shin was used to. Even when her birthday came around in April, he didn’t get to spend it with her, her family went out with ‘Parsley’. He guessed Parsley must’ve been a pureblood Japanese man and acceptable. He managed to ask this of Lyla and she shook her head. _“He’s Greek.”_

Greek. Shin had absolutely no problem with that. _However_ , should Lyla marry Parsley, and they have children, those children would be mixed race. And unless their grandfather was just picking racist reasons to pick Shin and his family apart for them specifically, Shin had assumed that’d be an _issue_. He looked up Parsley’s family, however, and found they were rich so he could see where some ‘issues’ might fall to the wayside.

If it wasn’t enough that she was off with her ‘suitor’ more, if they were together she was practically _obsessing_ over him. ‘Parsley went to this’, ‘Parsley went to that’, ‘Parsley said _this_ ’. Koji had smirked at him when Lyla left to go see her beloved Parsley and advised Shin he was too polite because he probably would have said ‘fuck Parsley’ some minutes into the conversation. His brothers weren’t known for tact.

That was just it though. If his best friend says she’s found someone she really likes and wants him to meet them, shouldn’t he be all over that? Shouldn’t he want to meet this guy? Shouldn’t he want to make sure this was a decent person? For her? All these things ran through his head during the conversation so he agreed. But God knows he did not want to.  
  
So, he put on a nice shirt and slacks, dressing for the restaurant they were going. It was something French and though he wasn’t particularly keen on the cuisine, he figured it was going to be nice. He drove by himself as Lyla had been ‘picked up’. She really hadn’t ridden with him since his birthday…  
  
That was it though. Was it that maybe he was feeling what Koji said or was this normal? Lyla had been his best friend longer than they’d not been best friends so her having something taking her attention like that was a change. It didn’t have to be jealousy.

Walking into the restaurant, Shin took a deep breath and advised the hostess of the party he was looking for. He noticed the way she raised a brow at him, assessing him. Probably the eyes on this face. She briskly advised she’d be ‘back momentarily’ and walked into the dining area, most likely to confirm he was going to be joining ‘polite society’. He was already ready to leave.  
  
Nonetheless, when the woman returned, she looked flustered and shocked, quickly requesting he follow her. He followed her, a trifle confused, to the balcony where Lyla was already sitting with a fellow with ruddy hair. The very first thing Shin noticed was she did _not_ look pleased and ‘Parsley’ looked sort of amused. Red flags already, huh?  
  
“Shin, are you all right?” Lyla questioned huffily, standing.  
  
Eh? “Hmm? I’m okay, why?” he replied, puzzled.  
  
“The hostess didn’t have to do that. I told her you’d be joining us, she should have brought you back immediately.”  
  
“Oh, that” he waved a hand, “It’s fine.”  
  
“It is _not_. We should go to another restaurant” she said crossly.  
  
“Relax, Lai, I’m a big boy. She didn’t hurt my feelings at all” he assured.  
  
Standing, ‘Parsley’ chuckled, “I didn’t think you were the protective type, Lyla.”  
  
“There’s no reason to treat him that way” Lyla muttered, “I have pink hair and no one out here questions what I request.”  
  
Out here. “It’s fine, really, Lyla. So you must be the Parsley I hear all about. It’s nice to finally meet you” Shin said, reaching out his hand, glad to change at least _that_ subject. _  
  
_“Ah, same” Parsley smiled, shaking his hand.  
  
They all took a seat, Lyla almost reluctant. She was a little protective of him, he supposed, as she came to realize some people’s nature toward him. He started to reach out and touch her hand to assure her he was fine but…that probably wasn’t appropriate in front of a prospective fiancé.

Parsley ordered a glass of wine which should have been weird for him since his company weren’t able to legally drink for another year or so. He and Lyla ordered green tea. The man sipped the red cordial tenderly before smiling. “So Lyla told me your father is Dr. Yamada Yagami? Great man, I’ve been to several of his seminars.”  
  
Huh? “Oh, thank you. Lyla tells me you’re a botanist. Are you interested in medical as well?”  
  
Shaking his head to the negative, Parsley folded his fingers, “Your father studies plant matter and composition for medical purposes. He’s incredibly detailed for someone that didn’t study botany and he teaches very well.”  
  
Lyla’s suitor knew more about his own _father_ than him. “Ah, yes, dad’s always been very thorough, especially about studies.”  
  
“What about you? Taking up the family business?”   
  
Uh oh. “W-Well, I had planned to—and I haven’t spoken to Lyla about it yet—but I don’t believe it’s for me” Shin smiled some.  
  
She looked shocked, “W-What? Why?”  
  
“I…I dunno, it just didn’t really feel like where I could lend my skills or help like I want, you know?” Shin explained, turning his cup in his hands idly.  
  
Lyla looked…nervous, maybe? “Well, you were just shadowing, right? Maybe if you had been more hands-on, you’d feel differently.”  
  
“Perhaps…”  
  
Surprisingly, Parsley shook his head, “My family owns a vineyard. We sell wine. My family has sold wine for four generations. I did _not_ want to sell wine. I was very involved in the process, knew all the ins and outs, even manufactured it myself. At the end of the day, I knew that was not my calling. You know pretty quickly what’s not right for you.”  
  


She bit her lip. It had been a great thing when she heard he was going to a doctor, hadn’t it? Feeling a bit awkward, Shin murmured, “W-Well, I’m not a _hundred_ percent. Two more years and I’ll figure it out, right?”  
  
Parsley chuckled, “I’m getting the creeping suspicion, as humans, we don’t ever really ‘figure it out’. Probably why I went with plants.”  
  
“Huh…” Shin mused.  
  
They made their orders and he managed to speak with Parsley because Lyla had gone dead quiet since the ‘you know what’s not right for you’ remark. The thing was it was true. And all the steps to becoming a doctor? That was no inconsequential amount of time for him to force his way through only to conclude at the end of it he had made a mistake.

Parsley frowned when it was time for dessert, his pager beeping, indicating someone was trying to reach him. He sucked his cheek and looked up slowly, “I’m sorry, you all, something has come up. We’ll have to revisit dessert. Should I have your limo called, Lyla?”  
  
“Hmm? Oh, I…I can ride back with Shin” she said faintly.  
  
“Oh, terrific” Parsley smiled, standing, “It was a pleasure to meet you, Shin.”  
  
“Ah, likewise…”  
  
…If he were _pressed_ , Shin would say he seemed like a nice enough guy. Although his sudden ‘something coming up’ seemed a trifle suspicious. They walked with each other outside and Parsley patted Lyla on the shoulder. She smiled somewhat and he walked away to a Jeep. Oh man, he hadn’t seen a Jeep before. Maybe he was about to go on some crazy adventure.

Lyla hugged herself, starting to walk toward his car while he still watched in bemusement. Following after a moment, he climbed into the driver seat and pushed the key into the ignition. “Um…I like him. He’s neat, I suppose.”  
  
She just sighed. He got the creeping suspicion he’d done something wrong.

“I, uh, didn’t embarrass you or anything, right? I mean, we go to fancy places with my mom but we’re not exactly well-mannered.”  
  
“Oh, don’t be silly, Shin” Lyla scolded, “You’re only ever polite. Your whole family, in fact.”  
  
That’d be pressing it, this meeting would have gone about three hundred percent differently if it’d been Nelly or especially Koji. “Then what’s bothering you? Don’t say it’s nothing either.”  
  
“…What _will_ you be if not a doctor, Shin?”  
  
“I’m…I’m not sure yet. I still want to help people, Lyla, but now that I’ve ruled out doctoring, I doubt it’ll be quite as prestigious, whatever it is.”  
  
Her green eyes softened, rubbing his hand, “I don’t want to make it sound like that, Shin. I’m not concerned about ‘status’ or the ‘prestige’. I just know that when you say you want to ‘help people’, nothing is off limits.”  
  
Eh…? “I-I mean, I don’t know about _that_ precisely.”  
  
“I know” she said solemnly.

…What?

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_It was always surprising how much other people knew about him, about what path he would take in life, especially when he’d been absolutely clueless himself. He had to change the subject that day when Lyla said that, asking if she wanted to grab a milkshake and ride around with him, listening to old CDs instead. She’d smiled and nodded. They got a chocolate shake from their favorite place and managed to find a countryside to drive through, listening to Our Lady Peace._

_She came home with him and sat on the counter as he started to prepare dinner for his siblings. Dad was at the hospital, mom was in Madrid. It was common at that point for it just to be him and the twins making dinner. Jill and Tony were starting to cook as well. Shaun…well, Shaun probably had a few more years before they were confident he wouldn’t burn the house down.  
  
“You know, I was coming by earlier and saw Koji with a girl. Did something happen with my cousin?” Lyla asked.  
  
Mm… “Mm, he was a little secretive about it but, apparently, he ran off to Mineral Town to see her and found out she has a boyfriend” he sighed gravely, “I guess all bars are off now.”  
  
“Oh, pooh. Koji was so devoted” she pouted, resting her chin in her hands.  
  
Yea, and Koji had definitely made up for lost time. Since that day almost three months ago, he had slept with at least twenty girls that Shin had seen. He’d tried to scold his somewhat younger brother for playing with these women. Koji assured he was not promising them anything and that most of his ‘suitors’ had been only looking for a good time. Great._

_“So, you really like Parsley?”  
  
“Mm, yea, he’s very kind and sweet” she smiled. “And papa will respect him.”  
  
Shin gave her a look, “Lai--”  
  
“I know, Shin. I know my dad can’t decide who my husband will be. Or he shouldn’t because he can. I have no say, Shin. As far as he’s concerned, I’ll have no skills and I need to marry into a good family.”  
  
“Lyla” he said crossly, “Look, I dunno if I’ve ever said it before but you will never be a “skill-less” burden and your father is not going to use his own created hurdles to stop you. I dunno what I’m going to do yet but I’ll take care of you until we both figure it out.”  
  
She stuck out her tongue, “You mean your parents. We don’t have any money of our own.”  
  
“Well, yea” he rolled his eyes around, “But…not for long. If you feel like your dad is forcing you to marry someone you don’t want to, I’ll take care of you until you can live your life.”  
  
Lyla hugged him from behind as he sautéed the shrimp, preparing to make a pilaf, one of her favorite dishes. She murmured, “Did you make that for me?”  
  
“Hmm, somewhat. That olive tapenade seemed a little light” he teased.  
  
“Shin…”  
  
He frowned, about to ask her what was wrong when, naturally, the door swung open and somehow the ENTIRE brood walked in. “Well, well, if it isn’t the lovebirds” heckled Nelly, heavy footed.  
  
Leering, Shin gave him a look, “Are you two drunk?”  
  
Koji was all smiles when he appeared so yea, they were drunk. Lyla pouted, “Neri, Koji, you’re too young to drink.”  
  
“Of course, nee-san” Koji placated, wandering into the kitchen, “I, however, was not drinking for once and took our dear imoto to get her nails done.”  
  
Jill proudly showed off the glittery pink nails, “Nii-san took me for my early birthday present.”  
  
“Oh, those are so pretty!” gushed Lyla.  
  
Shin smirked, raising a brow at Koji as he started to take out pork belly. “I find it hard to believe you’ve stayed entirely out of trouble today and only took Jill to have a manicure.”  
  
“The night’s still young, bro” Koji snickered.  
  
Groaning, Shin started dishing the rice as Koji went to work finishing the main portion. They sat down to dinner and chatted and everything was swell. Eventually, Jill, Shaun, and Tony ran off to watch Pokemon and Nelly and Koji started to prepare for a “house party”…except he’d kill them himself if they had a party IN this house so it was more like a yard party. Lyla snuggled up with him so they could watch a movie and it felt…swell.  
  
Just… “You know, once you’re married, it can’t be like this. It can’t be us having dinner together with the kids and then watching movies together. It’ll be different” Shin said softly.  
  
Lyla seemed to be dozing off, her eyes closing, “…Yea. It will be.”  
  
…Meh._

“Maybe one day we’ll be able to get on the internet without it sounding like we’re summoning Satan.”  
  


Yagami Shin stared at the computer screen, impatiently waiting for the dial up connection to load and allow him to search for information. Koji was stretched out on his bed, listening to his discman. Sounded like he was stuck on “A.D.I.D.A.S” which was pretty much Koji’s personal anthem right now. Shaking his head, Shin leaned back and crossed his arms, tapping his fingers against his bicep.  
  
They had been watching the news because their father was going to make a brief appearance. The man was discussing recent treatments and discoveries about cardiovascular health. As usual, their father seemed a little nervous initially but started to get in the zone as he started speaking.

Shin hadn’t had the confidence to break it to his father that he was pretty certain he would not be a doctor.

He didn’t know the full story. He knew it was borderline movie or storybook that his mother was from the rich side of town, aka ‘the princess’, and his father came from the poor side, ‘aka the pauper’. The forces of something or someone brought them together. He did the math finally one day and realized his mother probably was around fifteen when he was conceived which super explained her dismay with the twin’s…well, promiscuity. They were on the other side and very well could be impregnating young women in their age group. Koji scoffed, remarking “Like I don’t know what a condom is”.  
  
From what Shin could ascertain, his mother basically ran away from home to save him because grandparents he never met were going to force her to get rid of him. Apparently, his dad’s mom wasn’t really on board either and put both of his parents out as well to struggle. His dad moved them to North Wasaba where he worked with Dr. Souma and went to school. He remembered when he was little, a woman named Rosie would come and check on them and would remark on how his mom worked with her while she was pregnant as a tailor. That was before, due to some circumstances that took place a month prior to his birth, his mom was whisked _back_ to her family home to marry her betrothed. His dad often said when he was little, when he’d had two hours of sleep and nothing to eat, he had to get her back.

Shin couldn’t fathom. He couldn’t even dream of what it took for his dad to get where he was. Yes, he’d had connections but he literally had to go to school and work full-time while being essentially a single father. His dad had…well, almost no one, except Shin’s basically nanny, Yaya. He bit his lip, reminding himself to call and check on her one day soon. It’d been a while.   
  
Just…his dad fought so hard for them. The idea of disappointing him made Shin physically ill.

Just, after his dad’s segment went off on how he was going to help people with heart disease, a report on the growing number of internment camps showed people in cages.  
  
All he could do was gape. There were _infants_ in the cages. _Infants_ they were going to kill because they were from a different, basically, caste. Or just a different cultural and social order. Assassinated.   
  
The kids had walked away after dad went off. Koji and Nelly remarked it was a ‘evil thing to do’. His mother shook her head.  
  
…Was that it? Was that…all they could do? Shake their heads, rebuke it? Was that it…?  
  
Doing a search, he bit his finger as the article generated. “…Japan isn’t even _involved_.”  
  
“Is that surprising?” Koji replied, signaling he wasn’t completely zoned out, “We try to be neutral after getting a portion of our fucking country blown to shreds.”  
  
“So we’re not going to get involved in this…” Shin muttered.  
  
Koji glanced to him quietly, “…No, I would say _we’re_ not.”  
  
Shooting him a look, Shin glowered at the computer. His namesake got shot close to a dozen times.  
  
His father named him Shin after Yaya’s older brother. That Shin was his dad’s best friend. That Shin, his father would say to him when the wine got his tongue a little looser, threw himself into the fire for no reason. He dealt drugs with the yakuza and he got killed for it. He…chose to place himself in danger.  
  
Nelly peeked in, blinking, “Yo, Koji, Sai is on the phone.”  
  
Koji grimaced, standing and rubbing his side, “Okay.”  
  
“Dude, you really need to stop screwing around with that and go to the doctor” Nelly scolded.

Frowning, Shin glanced back as Koji weakly staggered to his feet, remarking he was ‘peachy’. What now? Koji took the phone to talk to, surprisingly, his girlfriend? After like seven months of whoring, suddenly his brother was okay with having just one girlfriend. Well…he had stayed loyal to a girl he made a vow to when he was ten so maybe that wasn’t some impossibility.

Turning the computer off after checking his email, he rested his chin in his hand. It…it may have to be this way. He couldn’t just volunteer himself to go over somewhere his country wasn’t slightly involved. He could possibly move to another country who was but, as far as he could tell, it was only a small collective of the victimized people trying to fight.

He picked up his own personal line, his parents over literally all of the children being on the one line talking to people. They got him and the younger ones a line while the twins kept the old one. Dialing for Lyla, he tapped his fingers against his desk.  
  
…Lyla hated when they used to kill cartoon ducks. If…if he did this, would he…?  
  
“Shin!! Shin!!”  
  
Jolting, he quickly cut the phone off and ran for the yelling. In a house of five siblings, there were various reasons for yelling and usually they were just altercations.  
  
Shin inhaled when he found Koji crumpled over on the ground face down, holding his stomach and groaning, in the living room. Nelly was screaming ‘what’s wrong?’ while Jill was sobbing. Tony, the one that had called for him, looked to him frantically. “N-Nii-san, he was j-just talking and t-then he fainted--”  
  
Shaun was rubbing Koji’s back, essentially the only calm one. Shin made everyone move to make sure he wasn’t bleeding or anything on the surface. No…he looked fine. And he looked like he was coming to, confused. “The hell…?”  
  
“Nelly, get him up. We’ll take him to the hospital” Shin instructed, “Kids, get your coats.”  
  
“Should I get Koji’s too?” Shaun questioned.  
  
Nodding to give the youngest an extra task, he rushed to grab his keys and picked the phone up off the floor. Making sure Sai wasn’t still on the line, he called his mother where she was today. Luckily she was in Japan or she’d probably have lost her mind. Koji had been to her what he’d been to his dad…

“Hello?” the woman answered after a few long rings.  
  
“Mama, Koji’s collapsed. We’re taking him to papa’s hospital now.”  
  
“What?? What’s wrong?!” she instantly panicked.  
  
Shin bit his lip, looking to Koji. Koji was a sickly type so he spent time in and out of the hospital for random occurrences. Usually this was met by his dismay and assertion that he was ‘just fine’. However, Shin felt a cloying sense of worry since he was quite conscious and not even slightly trying to persuade them not to take him to the doctor. “W-We’re not sure. We’re getting him to dad immediately.”  
  
“I’ll meet you all there. Are you getting an ambulance?”  
  
“No, I-I’ll get him there safely, I promise.”  
  
“I know. You all be safe and take care of Koji.”  
  
Agreeing, he clicked off and helped shrug Koji into a hoodie. Nelly walked him to the door carefully and the tribe of children followed. What was this?  
  
“Shin? Masoko said you—oh my God!”  
  
Okamoto Lyla had apparently gotten the message about his aborted call and had come over. He smiled quickly, “Y-Yea, I have to get him to the hospital.”  
  
“Oh, Koji, sweetie” she rasped, following behind them.  
  
He supposed Lyla was always going to be present, at least for now, without question climbing into his very small car with them. Shin gunned it to the hospital, figuring this was just a case of pneumonia. The idiot smoked so he was getting way more bronchial things too so who knows?  
  
Pulling to the door of the hospital to make the commute easier, he was surprised to see his father outside waiting with a nurse and a stretcher. His brows were furrowed with concern, running toward the door. “Hey, your mama called ahead in a panic. What’s going on?”  
  
“We don’t know. Tony said he’d just been talking on the phone and then he just collapsed” Shin explained, opening the door to let the seat up for the kids.  
  
Nelly looked hesitant as he helped his dad put Koji on the rolling bed. “…Papa, he has been feeling pains in his stomach for a while now but he just thought it was another ulcer. He’s been treating that.”  
  
Yamada groaned, “Nelly, he is not a doctor and if it persisted longer than a week, he knows he should have said something.”  
  
“Dad…”  
  
They jumped, startled when Koji finally said something. It seemed he’d been in and out of consciousness. However, he looked to their father deliriously. “Am I gonna die…?”  
  
“Of course not” Yamada reassured calmly, “We’ll find whatever it is and fix you up, okay?”  
  
“You said that last time too…”  
  
Hmm? Their father froze. What? Yamada stared at Koji as he passed back out, his blue eyes wide. Oh…oh, was…that something from…? Nelly looked briefly alarmed before shaking his head, “H-He’s just out of it, dad. Let’s get him checked out.”  
  
His father said absolutely nothing to that, following as they wheeled Koji in. Lyla held Shin’s hand tightly as they entered the hospital. It…it was going to be okay, he knew, but…

They sat in the lobby, their frantic mother joining them after maybe fifteen minutes. While Shin was concerned, of course, his mind was still on those babies locked in cages waiting to die.   
  
However, when they were examining Koji for close to two hours, his attention did come front and center. Usually it was something like he was very anemic or a bad case of pneumonia. It didn’t take _this_ long…  
  
Finally, their father came out of the room, having been present while the other doctors examined Koji. His light brows were furrowed tightly as he gazed absently at them. What? Their mom jumped to her feet, frantic, “Yama, is Koji okay?”  
  
“…I…”  
  
Shin felt his pulse jump. His father was at a loss of words and their father was always quick to reassure them. Had…had it been worse than Shin imagined? Hell, he at least oversaw the twins a little bit, he should have pressed when he noticed Koji wasn’t feeling well! Just…just maybe he was overthinking. Maybe it was something crazy Koji had caused.  
  
“…There’s a growth in his stomach. It’s…it’s either a polyp or a tumor but our initial testing is pointing toward it being cancerous.”  
  
Their mother blanched as they all stared at him, baffled. Cancerous? _Cancer_? “N-Nii-san has cancer, papa?” Jill whimpered, “I-Is he—Is he—”  
  
“Dad, this is _crazy!!_ Koji _just_ had a checkup not two months ago, there’s no way!” Nelly screamed.  
  
“Stomach cancer is very difficult to diagnose, Nelly, especially without symptoms. And it’s quite rare— _if_ that’s what he has. As I said, it can very well be a benign polyp. But…they’re going to check him out. Let’s…let’s just hope for the best.”  
  
…Hope for the best? That’s it? That’s…that’s all they could do?  
  
Shin almost choked trying to swallow, shivering. It…it had always been a little weird having a little brother that close in age to himself. They were really just barely a year apart. When they were toddlers, Koji was never very rambunctious. They…they really had no idea when…when he was starting to get…hurt and…  
  
And after…after that, he could have cancer?  
  
Quickly standing, he rasped, “U-Um, I’ll be right back.”  
  
Not waiting for a response, he quickly went to the bathroom and threw up. _Fuck_. Gagging, he rapidly shook his head. One of his classmates had beaten cancer. _Beaten_ cancer and lived. Maybe a year later, he got hit by a fucking _drunk driver_. He knew beating cancer didn’t give anyone some sort of invincibility but after _all that_? After chemo, after his body trying to _kill_ him?   
  
Koji…didn’t even know what he’d been through but…but Shin knew. He knew and…and this?  
  
Taking a deep breath in, he splashed water from the sink against his face after rinsing his mouth, letting the droplets run down his chin. He…he wasn’t meant to be a doctor. He…he could help those babies in cages.  
  
But this? No. He…he wasn’t meant for that.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
Yagami Koji got mad about almost…everything. Nothing _too_ miniscule but he had a temper. Someone saying something off-color about Jill or their mom was the quickest way to an ass kicking Shin had ever seen. He really hated when people chucked cigarette butts onto the grass too. Not an instant fight but at least a verbal admonishment. So Koji was a bit of a hothead.  
  
When dad told him there was a possibility he had cancer, Koji actually panicked for a few minutes but just numbly shrugged. Shin would be _angry_. But, again…Koji had no memory of what he’d been through to gauge that that? That had been enough right there.  
  
Okita Saiyuri, also known as ‘Sai’, showed up the next day to sit with him. They were going to do an endoscopy and maybe a biopsy. If it _was_ cancer, they... would have to remove it and treat Koji with chemotherapy, Shin reckoned. He was going to…to get sicker and possibly die. Sai held Koji’s hand and assured that he would be just fine. How did _anyone_ know that though?  
  
Shin irritably tapped his pencil against his desk at school. Nelly wasn’t able to come, he was just in shambles. That was his twin brother. Nelly had cried for a solid two days as a newborn because Koji was away from him, having been sick right at birth. A newborn. Now, almost sixteen years in, with his twin brother and best friend and he could die? No, Nelly was not in a good place.  
  
None of them were though, really. Their poor mom, she…she didn’t know what to do with this. What do you do when one of your kids was possibly going to face something like death? The younger kids, they…they didn’t know what to do either. Shin…had _no_ idea what to do. This…  
  
The only one…the only one with a semblance of hope and positivity was, strangely, Yagami Yamada. His father was the _last_ person that should have that sunny outlook. Usually his dad _was_ the last one to have a sunny outlook. He was a pragmatic man, that’s what had gotten him this far. But he, like Saiyuri, seemed to _insist_ this was going to turn out okay. Okay?  
  
Shin shook his head when math class ended and he just couldn’t be here anymore. He got up, picked up his bookbag, and left. He had never left school a day in his life but…he just couldn’t this time.  
  
He got in his car and drove for a while, listening to Nirvana. Was he going to have to listen to his favorite band and be reminded of late night music sessions with his brother in bitter nostalgia one day? Gritting his teeth, he gripped the wheel a bit tighter, driving just a smidge faster. Kurt Cobain suffered and took his own life. Was…was Koji going to suffer and lose his too?  
  
Recklessly pulling in front of his house, he started to march in and get a drink. He didn’t drink _much_ but lately he’d been partaking. Might as well, he could die tomorrow based on fate alone.  
  
However, he paused in front of the large black door and shivered. He…he wanted to help people. Just…just he didn’t know what to do when it was beyond his control like this.  
  
Shin wandered through the jungle, remembering the first time he had, he was trying to escape back to the life he once knew. This time, he was trying to escape a piece of his life possibly being taken. The first time, his escape was cancelled because he found he was okay finding a new one. This time?  
  
He frowned, hearing a soft sound somewhere. Perhaps crying. Going to investigate, he stopped a little ways when he found it was Lyla sitting on the steps of her deck, covering her face with her hands. “Lai?”  
  
His best friend looked up, startled, her face bright red and tearstained. “S-Shin? Wha-what are you doing home?”  
  
“I…wasn’t having a good day” he murmured, slowly walking closer, “What about you?”  
  
“…I also wasn’t having a good day” she smiled weakly.  
  
He sat beside her, his frown growing, “Well, you know why I’m not having a good day so tell me about yours.”  
  
She rapidly shook her head, gushing, “N-No, no, it’s nothing compared to what’s happening with Koji. I-Is he okay? Have you heard anything?”  
  
“No, I was going to take a breather before I headed over. We should know something tonight.”  
  
Lyla nodded, folding her hands, “I…I would really like to go with you.”  
  
“Of course, Lai…but tell me first: what’s wrong?”  
  
Groaning, she hugged herself and looked away. Shin tilted his head, reaching to hold her hand, “Lyla, please, if…if you can, tell me. I am feeling pretty damn useless right now. Let me be useful to you.”  
  


She was silent for some moments and he figured she wasn’t going to bother. Lyla was the type that would lock everything away to avoid burdening others and…and it wasn’t healthy. It was okay to vent. Squeezing her fingers, about to dismiss himself as a bother to her tendencies, she whispered: “Parsley.”  
  
“Parsley?”  
  
“…Remember how he left at the restaurant? Someone paged him?”  
  
“Yea?”  
  
“He was doing that a lot lately, you know? Every time we were out, even if we were eating with my parents” she explained softly, “…I…I guess since he’s a man, he has a lot more freedom.”  
  
Oh _boy_ , did he not like where this sounded like it was headed. “Lyla--”  
  
“Her name is Dianthe. He knew her back in Naoussa and they had been in love for a long time but his family didn’t get along with hers. He…he was humoring them with me, I suppose. Just long enough so that when Dianthe was able to secure a way, they can elope and move to an island.”  
  
Shin stared at her as she hugged herself, leaning over. So… “So, he was just…wasting your time and getting your feelings wrapped up for no reason?”  
  
“He wrote me a letter. He…he said he wasn’t trying to hurt me.”  
  
Oh _really?_ He was not the angry one…but everything lately had been getting under his skin. And this? Oh, this, this was the tipping point. Standing, his fists balled, he snarled, “The feeling isn’t mutual. Where is he?”  
  
Lyla reached up and gripped his hand, pressing the back of it to her cheek. “…I was just comfortable with the decision, Shin. I was thinking, ‘if father is okay with this, at the very least I’ll be comfortable’. I…I never once thought I’d be happy though.”  
  
Shin paused, shocked, and looked to her as she smiled grimly, “…How did it go? That Pink Floyd song? …Yes. Comfortably numb. I would have accepted that.”  
  
Shit. Sitting back down, Shin hugged her tight, kissing the top of her head. “…Then Parsley going off was for the best, Lyla. Maybe even intervention because I…I would never want you to live ‘comfortably numb’. I’m…I’m going to find a way that that doesn’t have to be your best option. Like…fuck Parsley.”  
  
She had pouted at him for that but they sat in silence for a little while. She had curled in his arms and he didn’t really understand but a miniscule part of himself felt better. And when they went to the hospital that night, they concluded that Koji had developed an adenoma. It was _potentially_ cancerous so they had to be removed but…but he didn’t need chemo. His father wanted him in the hospital for a long spell to do a long diagnostic, the man’s optimism eagerly melting back to his usually pessimistic outlook, but…but it had all worked out.  
  
It…it had nothing to do with him but…it had all worked itself out.

  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 **End Notes** : So, I wrote this about five-six months ago? In October, my aunt went into the hospital for low iron and anemia. She was so low they advised that should she have waited any longer, she would have had a heart attack. In a rare case of American healthcare, the doctor asked ‘well now, why IS that happening?’.   
  
While I was getting irritated with the hospital for doing all these tests despite her iron being restored, I was on my way home from my aerials class when my mother advised that they had located a cancerous polyp in her stomach. I was _stunned_ , especially since I had _literally just written about it_. I do have to say that I don’t know if its as easy as I put it in story. I dunno if it’s across the board but apparently in the US, when it comes to stomach cancer, we generally will put it at stage III even if it hasn’t spread? The oncologist advised that in a lot of Asian countries, it’s a part of their yearly screening versus here it’s generally always problem focused. Only in those places where it’s screen will you see the Stage 0 to 2. Or something.   
  
My aunt with breast cancer that died around the time I released Lessons in Life (which I took down because _yikes_ ), I didn’t get to particularly see the advancement because she lives about ten hours away. Getting to see my aunt daily, while she has lost her hair to chemotherapy, I do feel rather…optimistic? She’s taking the chemo and radiation therapy like a champion. She’s still on the go, she’s still eating, and she’s still so positive. I’m just hopeful that the procedure goes well.  
  
ANYWAY, Harvest Moon related: So, apparently in Save the Homeland, in a particular event, Lyla, who likes Parsley, will be depressed because he off and left to marry someone else? What a jerk. I’m going to reblog it on my Tumblr (hmlegacy). That’s what this was kind of based on.  
  
Happy Holidays!


	3. Faith

**Nomad,** Shin’s Story  
 **Chapter 3** : Faith  
  
 **Author’s Notes:** Happy New Decade, Ya’ll!

So I’m taking a course on auditing, and boy howdy, am I failing that jank! But I’m going to release some more of this because it’s at like almost 200 pages and counting and I still haven’t released but a third of it?

There is some very _light_ sexual themes near the beginning but nothing that becomes anything. Surprisingly, the next few chapters I speculate are about to be some of the smuttiest in the series which I never would have expected but just how it panned out.

For this clean, joyous chapter though, enjoy!  
  


XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _“…Hey, man, you…you okay?”  
  
Yagami Shin had heard Nelly say it a few times in different stages of his life. When he was a young child, he talked about how funny it was that this once, Koji was standing in a window when they were four years old. When he was around ten, he said with some skepticism how weird it was Koji was standing in a window in the middle of the night like that. At sixteen, Nerimaru would whisper ‘he was going to jump out of that fucking window, Shin’. _

_He…never quite knew what to say. Koji was this strange figure in his mind, like unyielding and ornery to the point of insanity. If he had to say any one person in his family he felt particularly threatened by, it would have to be Koji. Not insomuch that he’d hurt him. No, Koji didn’t hurt them, just…he knew if it came down to it? If Shin had done something that would incur Yagami Koji’s wrath, he’d never survive it. He was…dauntless. Thus, the idea that he was ever at a point so far in defeat that he’d kill himself just seemed…bewildering. So to currently find him sitting on the roof of their mansion, it went entirely against his vision.  
  
Koji was still wearing the all black suit he wore to the service, hugging his knees and apparently staring out in the distance in the autumn sundown. Shin tilted his head a bit, seeing he was gripping something in the hand visible to him. Looked like silver.  
  
Koji didn’t say anything. He might not have heard him. Shin felt a little queasy. “Koji.”  
  
“I’m not throwing myself off, Shin. Just wanted to think a little, shit.”  
  
Pursing his lips, not understanding why that couldn’t be done on stable ground, Shin nervously ambled out to sit a distance away from him. Koji wasn’t much for proximity when he was like this. While he’d sometimes go out on his parent’s balcony, he’d never done this. He could see a few different estates in the distance and the overhang of trees and the warm colors of the setting sun. It hadn’t gotten abominably cold yet so the gentle wind felt relaxing. Oh. “Huh, this…this isn’t as bad as I thought.”  
  
“Mm.”  
  
Of course, if he looked down, that might be another story. Shin curled his heels into the roof, gazing after some birds flying away, “…The world is kind of a miserable place, isn’t it?”  
  
“Yea.”  
  
“I can’t imagine you’re supposed to…do all this great stuff or what you want and then just…something takes that away from you in the spans of a few months. It’s…it’s stupid.”  
  
Koji’s eyes were half-closed, just empty and void. It was a peculiar thing. When Koji was busy fearing for his life only to be resolved that he could live on, Okita Saiyuri lost that same resolution. Leukemia. It…it was pretty devastating to witness. Shin was…thankful that he didn’t have to watch Koji go through that, he would have been a complete wreck, but…  
  
They weren’t together long but Koji admitted he was in love with her. ‘I…I dunno, she just knew how to talk to me. She…she knew how to get through a layer of something even I can’t break through’. Shin sort of knew what he meant and…and he was devastated that the outcome wasn’t Sai overcoming the illness, that she was taken by something so tumultuous, so cruel. He was sad that Koji seemed to be ready to give up.  
  
But… “What made you break that out? The necklace.”  
  
When he was ten, Koji had asked their mother if she could make a heart necklace and split the heart in two to mail to him before he left Mineral Town, where their maternal grandfather lived. Shin slightly recalled the woman being aghast that Koji was ready to ‘give a piece of his heart’ to someone so young. Pretty much everyone said she was overreacting and it was a cute sentiment. So, she did and that was the promise piece Koji had had for years with Lyla’s cousin. He put it away not too long ago when he said ‘fairytales were bullshit’.   
  
“…Sai. I guess she was asking that I not give up on love or a future” Koji shrugged absently, “…Little hard to do after seeing her dead.”  
  
“…I can only imagine.”  
  
“I’m glad Parsley’s out of the picture.”  
  
Shin made a face, glancing to Koji, uncertain if he could believe his brother was already back to nudging that he and Lyla would be a good couple. “Koji, she’s my best friend. That’s it. I don’t want any more than that.”  
  
Shrugging, his somewhat younger brother planted his palms on either side of him, “That’s fine, Shin. And I get it, really. But I hope you also get what I’ve always alluded to for her. I guess I’ll do it if I have to but you seem more logical.”  
  
…Damn. Shin made a face, shaking his head, “Our mom. Lyla…how do you just decide who someone is gonna marry? That’s a partnership, a…a bond. You don’t just decide for someone else who that gets to be.”  
  
“Shouldn’t, but what you described also can be mutated into a business agreement” Koji murmured, “And Lyla is his only stock so the stakes need to be good.”  
  
Bull. “I wouldn’t give him a bronze coin. What I won’t do is BUY someone either.”  
  
Koji gazed up, frowning, “…Yea, guess I didn’t think that far ahead. Y’know, since we’re just a bunch of heathen hafu to him anyway.”  
  
“…I do love Lyla, Koji, and I’ll do whatever I have to for her. But I…I might do some things that aren’t going to put me in good standing with OUR dad, let alone hers.”  
  
His brother looked at him with a raised brow, “…I struggle to imagine a scenario that would make that occur, man. What are you planning?”  
  
“Well…I’m not sure yet, but…if I’m still thinking about it a year from now? You’ll be the first to know because I’m going to need you to talk me out of it” Shin sighed deeply.  
  
Koji’s face grew even more incredulous, slowly shaking his head, “…I literally just lost my girlfriend, Shin, I dunno if I’m ready to get additional crazy out of you of all people.”  
  
“Promise, Koji, we’ll worry about that in a year and a half, okay?” Shin murmured, “…For now, can we please get off this roof?”  
  
“Fine.”  
  
Patting Koji’s back as they went back through the window, he honestly hoped something else fell in his lap because his dad? While he still hadn’t addressed not being a doctor with the man, he knew the man would rather him do ANYTHING but what he was leaning toward. It was almost laughing in the face of what his father did. It would be like dying from something he did have some control over because he put himself in that situation.  
  
…He would be throwing himself into a type of unpredictable chaos. A year and a half.  
  
_XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
“Shin??”  
  
Yagami Shin opened his eyes and it was the day before his 18th birthday.  
  
He was exhausted after exams and found himself lying in bed on Saturday. It wasn’t only the long hours studying that had him fatigued but, oh, that potential decision that would have the father that sacrificed _everything_ to make sure he lived comfortably hate him? He was still considering it.   
  
He did _one more_ shadowing of his dad’s hospital just to make sure he wasn’t just giving up. No, when he saw firsthand a man die from going into cardiac arrest, he knew. He sat down with his dad in his office that night.  
  
 _“…Papa, I never want to disappoint you.”  
  
_ Yagami Yamada had looked startled, like this wasn’t a sentiment he was expecting. Yea, comparing his parents to other parents, Yagami Yamada and Dana were very liberal. They never made them feel like they had expected career paths. Still, to say he had changed his mind from the job his dad was so devoted to?  
  
 _“Shin, I…I hope I have never in your life made it seem like a decision you make would disappoint me. I mean, aside from killing someone.”  
  
_ …Yea. _“Y-Yea. So, uh, I just…I don’t think I can deal with the things I can’t change being a doctor, dad. I get it, you do all you can and that’s the task. Just, to do ALL you can? And…and have it not matter at all? Like, in any capacity? I…I can’t do that. I’m sorry.”  
  
“Well…I mean, I am a little disappointed but not with you, son. It’s not looking strong that any of my brood is taking the doctor path at this point…”  
  
_Yea, Shin had a strong feeling that no one after him would even much consider it. _“It is a tough job and I know the time I’ve had to be away from you all hasn’t made it look any better. I understand.”  
  
_ Oh, of course he could understand that. But would he understand Shin’s next course of action?   
  
He yelped, shocked, when someone pounced on top of him. He was kind of used to that but…well, his body wasn’t quite in an appropriate frame for this person in particularly to be jumping on him. Okamoto Lyla also looked a little surprised, his ‘assaulter’ and he flustered, smiling as he sat up. “Uh, yea, sorry.”  
  
“Oh, um, was I…?”  
  
“N-No, no, it’s a…dude thing. We just wake up like that. You know, in case you end up with some guy that tries to make that into something else.”  
  
Lyla scowled pensively as she sat on the unoccupied side of the bed, Shin standing up and wrapping one of his blankets around his hips. “…I guess that is good to know. It’s kind of late for you to be asleep though.”  
  
He looked at the clock and groaned, not realizing it was one o’clock in the afternoon. He was surprised the kids weren’t bothering him. Of course, another shocking development of life was his little siblings were bratty pre-teens that didn’t need big brother. Jill had actually started making dinner on her own too. It was…wistful. A lot of things were.  
  
“Just…anxiety, Lai.”  
  
“About what?” she asked, crossing her legs.  
  
Entering his bathroom, he ran his fingers through his hair, “…The future.”  
  
“Oh yea, I know what you mean” Lyla groaned, “I can’t believe where father is sending me.”  
  
Yea, he couldn’t either. By February, Lyla had been informed that she was going to a ‘lady’s school’. He had literally no idea what that meant, he imagined it was just an all-girl’s college. Alas, his mom looked somewhat taken aback before disclosing it was like a small dormitory where young women were sent to learn to be wives. Um, what? _“…I…I mean, is she going to learn like…science or math or literature? Something?”  
  
“How to sip tea and be quiet, Shin. Nothing more, nothing less.”  
  
_Oh, terrific. And she didn’t care either because she was never allowed to have a damn goal. Like his mom, she was supposed to be someone’s _wife_. After that, that’s it: she was a wife. Done. Nothing else needed to be accomplished.   
  
“Lyla, come on, like, you’ve really been getting into those floral bands and stuff. You could definitely be a florist or something” he insisted, turning on the water to wash his face.  
  
She shrugged. Terrific. “Lai…”  
  
“I understand, Shin. I can do a lot of things. What about you?”  
  
Grimacing, he rubbed his face and droned, “I…dunno yet.”  
  
“You’re going to college, right?”  
  
…Man. “Um, let’s…discuss that over lunch. Have you had lunch yet? Let me take a shower.”  
  
Shin quickly turned on the shower to drown out the question because, no matter what? He did not intend to go to college right now.  
  
Koji was confusingly into stocks and the like, often looking at their mother’s finances at Yagada and thinking about long-term investments. Something of a savant, really. He was going to college for his bachelor’s in business administration or something, he’d already decided. Nelly just shrugged and decided he’d do the same. Koji admitted to Shin that he intended to go to a school away from Nelly. Not because he really didn’t want to be with his brother, he clarified, but he thought a little separation was healthy given they’d been together their whole lives. Fair.  
  
But…him? Shin looked at every college and none of it would aid him in his goal, not even internationally. After he potentially met his endeavors, he might pursue a degree in something like criminal justice but as of right now? No…he was not attending college, yet another thing for his dad to be pissed about when he announced it.  
  
Taking a quick rinse, he came out and…found Lyla looking at a porn magazine he apparently did not rehide.   
  
He inhaled, quickly rushing to take it from her, “U-Uh, th-that shouldn’t have been out like that, sorry!”  
  
His best friend gave him a bit of a look, “So you _were._ ”  
  
“Not this morning! Seriously, morning wood, it’s totally a thing” he groaned.  
  
Lyla waved a hand, standing up, “Oh no, that part I believe.”  
  
Eh? “But I guess I didn’t think you were the type to look at that sort of thing” she sighed airily.  
  
“Well, unfortunately, I am human, Lai.”  
  
Petting down her long skirt, a sign that her dad was back, she frowned. “…So that makes you human?”  
  
“I mean…I guess not, if you don’t want to or need then why do it but-t-t-t I get a little tense sometimes, y’know?”  
  
She just raised a brow at him and he figured she fell in that ‘don’t need to’ category. That or…well, damn, she was watched over so closely at home, maybe she just didn’t really have the capability…  
  
On his list of things to offer her, a place to get in some hand time was probably at the pinnacle of awkward so he’d probably exit stage left on that. He tilted his head, “Anywho, wanna go grab a bowl of ramen with me?”  
  
“Sure” she agreed, her eyes closing some, “…If you answer some more questions.”  
  
…Ho boy. “Um…kay.”  
  
He was…not entirely certain he wanted to follow the previous line of questions? But maybe she was talking about college which was also not a line of questions he wanted to answer. He smiled nervously as they quietly got in his car. She’d acted…kind of weird since Parsley ran off and eloped. She had actually started to avoid him for a bit there and he was wondering if he’d said something wrong. He sent her flowers to apologize and she had come over, assuring he had done literally nothing to her before resuming her normal habits. Just, she didn’t hold hands with him anymore and she didn’t give him hugs. There…was a distance he didn’t quite get.  
  
“The picture with the girl’s face between the other girl’s legs, what was happening?” she questioned bluntly.  
  
Welp. At a loss of words for a solid minute, Shin stared as his driveway became the length of the Earth. “…Um, w-well, that…”  
  
“Do you know?”  
  
“I-It’s…called, um…”  
  
Okay, couldn’t do it. “You know what? Let me turn around and get Koji, he’s great for this” Shin blurted, looking back and about to do a full speeding reverse back to the mansion.  
  
“No way, Shin” Lyla pouted, “Koji-chan is younger than me. I’d feel stupid having him tell me these things.”  
  
“That whore is definitely not a ‘chan’, Lai” Shin snorted dryly, “…Ugh, but fine. It’s…it’s oral sex. You…you use your tongue and mouth to kind of…pleasure down there, if you will.”  
  
Lyla looked confused. “…Would it even feel that good?”  
  
“Um, I’m not sure for a girl but I’ve heard it feels good? If your partner knows what they’re doing anyway.”  
  
Her green eyes narrowed pensively before shaking her head, “And the hands?”  
  
“…Hands?”  
  
“Yea, the other picture, the girl had her hands there too. Why?”  
  
That…definitely answered some of his previous questions then. “W-Well, Lyla, I mean, we-weren’t you suggesting I was…you know… _handling_ myself?”  
  
“Yes, I unfortunately caught one of my cousins when he was at our summer villa so I know about that Lyla assured, “But the picture, it was a girl.”  
  
Shin’s brows dropped, stopping at a red light, “…I mean, Lai, you do know it’s not like a male one way street, right? Like, guys and girls…masturbate.”  
  
Apparently this was news to her as she scoffed, “A girl wouldn’t have that ‘equipment’, Shin.”  
  
“The equipment’s different but the end result is the same! You…massage as a woman in different places and…maybe like in that picture you…you know, you finger.”  
  
“And that weird pink thing?”  
  
“…That was a sex toy. It…also can go places.”  
  
One thing was for certain, he was sure ready to have the talk if he had kids because this awkwardness had to be incomparable to anything he’d ever face again. He guessed he hadn’t considered how repressed she probably was. “I-I mean, Lyla, since we’re all up in the awkward closet right now, I may as well take the extra step and offer but, y’know, you can always use your guest room to…explore if you want.”  
  
“… _Myself_?”  
  
“Yes!” he groaned, “Lyla, it’s your body. And I would hate for you to get involved with someone and think that you’re not supposed to get something out of sex!”  
  
He pulled into the lot of the ramen place and Lyla idly tapped the sill of the window, looking…annoyed for some reason? “…You’re not going to college, Shin?”  
  
“…No, Lai. I…I have other plans but I’m not ready to tell you yet. I’m…I’m not ready for all the disappointment yet.”  
  
Staring at him, her face finally softened and she kissed his cheek. “I love you, doofus. I told you you’d never disappoint me.”  
  
He’d be lying to himself if he didn’t feel the way his heart skipped when she said that initial part. Just, duh, he…he had told Koji that he loved her too so it didn’t have to mean anything beyond platonic feelings. But…  
  
“I…I think this will, Lyla. I’m sorry.”  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
May. He graduated from high school at the end of this month and…he had done it. He’d committed but hadn’t told a soul. That was because he knew inside that this was what he wanted but…  
  
Shin awkwardly walked out of the Yagami Mansion, preparing to go for a walk, but instead stopped on the porch. Yagami Koji was sitting in his black car. Despite the twins being nothing but trouble, their dad gifted both Nelly and Koji 1998 Toyota Supra, blue and black respectively. Currently his younger brother was sitting in his, listening to the Deftones and smoking a cigarette. Well…he told him he’d tell him first.  
  
Wandering over to the driver’s door, he lightly tapped on Koji’s window. Koji had really been trying to make a turn around. He was trying to get in less fights and be calmer…but honestly, Shin figured that was taking a toll on him as he currently had his head rested against the steering wheel. Maybe not a good time…  
  
Koji rolled down the window though, his black cigarette between his lips, “…Yes?”  
  
“Can I talk to you about something? You know, that something we were talking about on the roof a year ago?”  
  
His brow rose and Koji slowly nodded, tilting his head to gesture he climb in the passenger’s seat. Shin took a deep breath and opened the door, taking a seat while Koji turned off his music. “…Honestly almost forgot about that. What’s the big secret?”  
  
“…I’m not going to college, Koji.”  
  
“Yea, can sort of see that not being a thing I would want to tell our parents” Koji snorted.  
  
“No, that’s not even the tip of the iceberg, Koji.”  
  
Koji held up a hand to pause him, taking a long inhale, before rasping: “….All right, go.”  
  
“I joined the Army. I’m going to go overseas and help in the Terran Initiative.”  
  
Koji’s head fell back against the seat, shaking it slowly, “…I knew it. I knew you weren’t gonna leave that alone.”  
  
“Koji, we can’t turn our heads when people are suffering. It’s not the right thing to do and I think I can help. I know I can.”  
  
Kneading his brow, Koji whispered, “…Shin, you could die.”  
  
… “I…I know that, Koji, and that’s why I’ve been struggling to tell dad” he whimpered, his eyes burning. “How? How do I tell this to dad, huh? How do I tell him I turned from the doctor’s path for something like this? He gave me the name of his best friend that got brutally gunned down in the streets and I just fucking volunteered to possibly get gunned down in the streets. How do I tell him when he put _everything_ into making sure we made it out of the slums? How do I tell him, this… _saint_ that’s been saving people’s lives for twenty years now that I might be out there taking them instead?”  
  
“You just gave me the most _monstrous_ headache in a matter of seconds” Koji laughed dryly, “I do _not_ envy you, Shin, because I’m sorry to tell you: dad is _not_ going to like it. You are his _baby_ and this is real unnecessary to _us_. I get it, man, I do. I want to help, I want to stop atrocities, but I guess that’s where I wuss out. I don’t have the drive in me to go over somewhere and get shot at by my enemies.”  
  
Shin snorted, “Really? You’d be the first person I’d take with me.”  
  
Koji smiled, tapping the cylinder into the ashtray, “…I guess I would do what I’d have to.”  
  
“And something inside me is telling me this what I need to do, Koji. This is where my path is leading me and I…I unfortunately went past the point where you talk me out of it. I leave after Jill and Tony’s birthday for bootcamp. I’ll be there until Christmas then I’m going to be out for three months while they decide where to send me. I’ll probably end up deployed on my 19th birthday.”  
  
“…Shit, Shin” hissed Koji.  
  
“I…I know. It’s moving fast.”  
  
“…How do you think even mom’s going to take this? She’s not going to like it either.”  
  
Grimacing, he rubbed his neck. He heard when it was found out Yagami Dana was pregnant with him as a teenager, her mother was going to force her to abort him. Their mama then proceeded to cut a hole in the floor and crawl in the space under the house in the mud and rain to escape to save his life at the risk of her own.   
  
“Hey, hey” Koji scowled as Shin started to hyperventilate, the younger reaching out to rub his back, “I think you’re crazy as fuck but I have your back, okay? I support you. And Nelly probably won’t be crazy about this either but I know he’ll come around. Yea, our parents have done a whole hell of a lot for us to get us here, Shin, but they didn’t do that so we stayed within expectations. If this is what your heart said you needed to do then do it. Just you promise me that you live. Whatever it _takes_ , you promise me you come home at the end. I don’t tell you jerks this enough but I love you and you don’t get to check out on me after all the shit we’ve been through.”  
  
Swallowing, a tear rolling down his face, Shin pursed his lips before breathing. “Promise.”  
  
“Okay. When are you gonna tell them?”  
  
“…Graduation night.”  
  
…Might as well let them down on a momentous day.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
“… _What_?”  
  
Yea, it had been a good day.  
  
He woke up that morning throwing up before showering, combing his hair, and putting on his uniform. Yagami Yamada and Dana were all smiles and gushing over him when he came down the steps. ” _I’m so proud of you, son. I…I’m so glad this went differently for you.”  
  
_ A part of him just wanted to lock himself in a closet and think about what he was doing a little more after that but, well, here they were.  
  
Lyla had already graduated so she had dressed up in a beautiful yellow sundress, wearing the necklace he’d given her those years ago at the beach and a gorgeous smile. God, she hated killing _video game ducks_ , what…what was he going to do when she hated him?  
  
It was _only_ agony, sitting there while the class president spoke to them about the future and how wonderful it could be. Yea, it was looking really not wonderful right now. He was probably white as a sheet when he went up on the podium and retrieved acknowledgment. Soon.  
  
His family praised him and took pictures with him before taking him out to dinner. No, this was not a restaurant announcement so he held his tongue, nibbling at his food. He smiled weakly when Shaun asked him ‘now what?’. His dad did look to him curiously as he fumbled with a non-answer.   
  
So, around seven o’clock that night, when they arrived back, Lyla almost left to go home but he requested she stay for a moment. He…he asked if everyone could sit at their kitchen table because he wanted to tell them something. They say in birth order while Lyla sat across from him, his mom and dad at the head. It…felt like he was about to be sentenced to oblivion but…  
  
He knew he had to. He told them he wasn’t going to school and he’d joined the military.  
  
At first, there was…dead empty silence. He wasn’t even sure he’d said anything at one point until, finally, his father said that. _What?  
  
_ “W-what are you _talking about,_ Shin?” his dad shook his head.  
  
“D-Dad, I want to be a part of the Terran Initiative. I…I want to go help rescue people from the Zechs.”  
  
His father was a lot of things. Kind, gentle, patient, and…compassionate. Sometimes he said he’d actually gained those attributes. Shin could tell he was about to see the prior version.   
  
“Have you _lost your damn mind_?”  
  
Shin sighed, covering his face, because the glimpse he caught of his dad’s, it looked like he was about to explode. “Shin— _Shin_. You—do you _realize_ what war entails? Do you know what it _means_ when you go up against someone that wants you _dead_? You aren’t sharing those people’s intentions, Shin, you are going against them and they are going to try to _kill you_. What are you _thinking_?”  
  
“You’re gonna kill people, nii-san?” Shaun gawked.  
  
“What?? No—I mean, I—I dunno, maybe?”  
  
Yes, he possibly was. He knew that but suddenly it occurred to him he didn’t want his younger siblings thinking of him as a _killer_. Yamada glared, “No. This is not up for discussion. You are _not_ joining the military, Shin.”  
  
“I…I already have, dad.”  
  
“Well, I’m going to go tell them you’ve lost your mind and to forget it because you’re _not going_ , Shin!”  
  
Shaking, feeling…a little discouraged, Shin grimaced when Koji countered, “Dad, Shin’s been thinking about this for _years_. You’re not listening to him.”  
  
“Oh, so you _knew_ about this?”  
  
Shin quickly defended, “Dad, please, I-I confided in Koji but I wanted to be the one that told you this. He respected my decision and I’m-I’m just asking that you respect my decision too. Dad, I-I swear, I will be fine. I’m-I’m going to make it--”  
  
“How the hell can you _promise that_?!”  
  
His eyes widened, gaping as his father’s eyes pierced through him, just…enraged. “You can’t _promise that_ to me, Shin!!”  
  
And his father almost threw his chair over and marched out of the house, slamming the door loudly behind him. Huh. That…went precisely as he expected.  
  
Jill slowly stood, folding her hands, “I-I’m sorry, nii-san, but-but I don’t want you to go either.”  
  
“Jill, sweetie--”  
  
“You’re being selfish! Wha-what about us?!” she sobbed, “This is everyone! Everyone in the room, this is all we have! You-you’re being selfish!”  
  
He probably would have preferred to die at this point as she ran off, crying, Tony quickly going after her. Nelly tapped his fingertips against the table before giving Koji a look, “…So you really are cool with this, huh?”  
  
“…He swore to me he wouldn’t get killed and that’s enough for me. All we have is our word.”  
  
Nelly frowned at him before wincing, “…Um, we’re…we’re gonna go check on Jill. _Koji_.”  
  
Koji stood and patted his shoulder as he tried not to hurl, following his twin up the stairs, the two dragging a stunned Shaun with them. Shin took a deep breath and looked to his mother, expecting her to be just…livid. She…she went through just as much if not more to give birth to him and he was just ready to go put that on the line like he was gambling away everything she did.   
  
…Surprisingly, she was calm. Maybe calmly ready to lay him the hell out. However, she gave him a soft smile, “…He’s angry right now, sweetie plum, but your papa can’t see it’s his heart reflected in you. The…path is different but I’m not surprised in the least.”  
  
Oh. He breathed _some_ relief as she came over and kissed his forehead, hugging his shoulders. “I’ll talk to him, okay? Don’t fret.”  
  
“T-Thank you, mama.”  
  
…He met her getting lost in ‘the jungle’. She was just this ethereal magical being to him and she….she had come through a lot of tides with him too. Weakly looking to Lyla, he stared at her as she stared back, her eyes half-closed and her arms crossed.  
  
“…I told you nothing was off limits, Yagami Shin.”  
  
…Shit.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _His dad didn’t come back. Or, at the very least, he didn’t come back and yell at him some more. Shin remembered coming down the stairs to get some water, surprised to hear talking. Sneaking toward the living room, he wedged himself against the corner.  
  
“How can you SAY that, Dana? HOW?!”  
  
Oh jeez. Biting his lip, he took a deep breath. No, no, don’t…don’t yell at mom for his decisions. He’d…he’d interject.  
  
“I’m asking that…that you have a little faith in him, Yama, that’s all.”  
  
“You know what else I had faith in? That bastard friend of mine changing and getting better and look at EVERYTHING he did, Dana! Look where he IS! I don’t have ANY faith, Dana, especially faith that they’re gonna have pity on my son over in the damn desert!”  
  
Shin swallowed hard, daring a peek to see where they were positioned. They were by the French doors in the huge room, his dad looking out and his mom behind him. She had fallen quiet so maybe she didn’t know how to counter that. Honestly, Shin…didn’t either.  
  
His father looked…entirely peaked, his brows furrowed and the skin around his eyes tight, his jaw equally as taut. Definitely brought out that old side of him, he guessed. He shook his head slowly, “…I held him in my hands when he was born. I held him as-as that helpless newborn and I knew I had to give him everything I had. Sometimes I’d quit in my mind, want to wipe my hands of the duty, but all I had to do was look at him and know that I needed to give him the best—Dana, I turned my back from YOU at some point for our son. Now? Now I-I have to accept him going off to possibly get killed when I’ve spent my entire life trying to make sure that didn’t happen?”  
  
“…He wants to help people, Yama, just like you do. People that…that aren’t as privileged as we are. There…there are babies in cages, people being eradicated for no reason. He…he, like you, saw that and wanted to make a difference.”  
  
Mama… “Then-then RALLY? Protest? Make petitions? SOMETHING that doesn’t place a gun in his hands that has him both KILLING people and having people try to kill him! Do you know how DAMAGING it is to kill someone?”  
  
“Do you?”  
  
Shin frowned, confused. What…? His dad fell quiet and Dana asserted, “YOU did not kill Shin. You did not kill Hisekawa. All those people, their blood was not on your hands, Yagami Yamada, and I want you to realize that one day.”  
  
“…I have realized, Dana. But I was a part of their demise and it shakes me to this day, just being…a component. Imagine if I pull the trigger, play judge, jury, and executioner? I can’t think of one person I’d be okay doing that to.”  
  
“Oh really?”  
  
…Shin was a little disturbed when suddenly his father…sort of smiled darkly? What?? “…Mm, no, you’re right. There’s one I would feel very comfortable with.”  
  
“And you will NEVER pursue that bloodlust, correct?” Dana snorted.  
  
“Sure.”  
  
“I mean it, Yagami Yamada, promise me. And…and promise that…you’ll try to be understanding and forgiving of our son’s choice. I don’t know what he’s going to go through, I…I honestly don’t even know what’s going to happen to him, but…please? If…if not for him, for me?”  
  
Staring as his father fell silent for some long moments, the man finally turned to Dana, taking her hand and pressing it to his cheek. “…I’d do everything for you, Seika. This…this will take a little time though.”  
  
“I know” she assured, “And I know you…ran out of faith so I’ll carry us both.”  
  
Kissing her palm, his dad took a deep breath and appeared…calmer. He guessed he heard that once, that his dad considered their mom his comfort. He…he wondered how much it would work.  
  
Sneaking away when they apparently were going to kiss a little more, his mind did wander to Lyla. He had tried to call after she left but was told by her maids she was ‘asleep’. She…_

 _  
She probably hated him.  
  
_ “Have you ever heard dad call mom ‘seika’?”  
  
Koji, Nelly, Tony, and Shaun had come out to eat sushi with him. Kaiten-zushi as they were feeling particularly hungry. Jill still despised him right now, rejecting the offer in a huff. This…this was rough.  
  
Koji grabbed an eel roll off the conveyor belt, his brow rising, “…Seika? Universe?”  
  
“Yea, I suppose. You don’t think that’s like mom’s real name or something, right?”   
  
Nelly looked horrified. “…Seika? You think our mom’s been our mom for almost twenty years and her name is ‘Seika’?”  
  
“Nah. Probably a pet name” said Shaun, surprisingly sage.  
  
They all kind of groaned and ‘gagged’. Nelly leered, “Seika? That’s so…fucking _profound_. Can you imagine calling someone your universe?”  
  
“Mom better be dad’s universe” Koji snorted.  
  
Tony grabbed futomaki and sent Shin a bit of a look. “What did your girlfriend think of you joining the army, Shin?”  
  
“Yea, what girlfriend?” Shin said sarcastically.  
  
He had been dating a young woman for about a year now. When he revealed to her that he was not only not going to college but joining the armed forces, she dropped him so hard he wasn’t even surprised. To be honest, he…wasn’t really into her and should have ended it sooner. He gave Koji a bland look as his brother blinked at him knowingly, “And nee-san?”  
  
“’Nee-san’ hates my guts.”  
  
Nelly shook his head, “Can you blame her, Shin? We’re a bunch of rich kids, we don’t join the military unless we’re in trouble.”  
  
Rolling his eyes, Shin muttered, “Imagine, ‘rich kid’, if one of those kids was our little sister in a cage. Imagine enough people say ‘it’s not our problem’ and do nothing about it? I had to join through the American section to even get involved because Japan doesn’t want to get into the mix. I understand why Lai hates me but I…I have to do something.”  
  
“Like I said, Shin, do what you need to. But if it comes down to your life, do what you need to do too” Koji said flatly.  
  
Shin nodded and Shaun yawned, “Nee-san will forgive you anyway because she loves you, nii-san.”  
  
“Wow, has Koji recruited you?” Shin groaned.  
  
Tony snickered, “C’mon, nii-san, even the blind could see that one.”  
  
 _What_? He glowered, shaking his head, “You guys need to learn about ‘platonic’ relationships.”  
  
“We know what a platonic relationship is, bro” Nelly rolled his eyes.  
  
“I don’t, what’s that?” Shaun frowned.  
  
Koji sipped his soda, drawling, “It’s when you have a relationship with someone that is purely friendship. There’s nothing romantic or sexual going on. You know what sex is, right?”  
  
“Oh yea.”  
  
Smirking, Shin shook his head, “I’m always glad for these brotherly chats.”  
  
“I think it’s…platonic on your side, nii-san, but it’s probably not platonic on nee-san’s” Shaun shrugged.  
  
..Eh? Leaning back a bit, Shin shook his head, “…I don’t…think so?”  
  
“You wouldn’t” Koji droned.  
  
He always worried about that but he took the Parsley deal to mean she was definitely not that interested in him. Sure, he sort of wondered about the watch and little insular things she said but…he was fairly confident they were walking the same relationship street.  
  
With a sigh, he set down his chopsticks, “…You think dad will ever not hate me? And at this rate, Jill?”  
  
“Jill is coming around” Tony assured, tapping a napkin against his lips, “She was researching it and started to feel bad for the Terran kids. I don’t know if she wants _you_ doing it but she agrees that something needs to be done.”  
  
Shin nodded solemnly and really just…wished his dad would talk to him. Despite that talk he eavesdropped on, the man didn’t even give him acknowledgement this morning before he left for work. It…felt a little unfair. While Shin knew this went _directly_ against what his father stood for, his dad never told him what it was he couldn’t do…

…This…was some roller coaster.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _“Papa?”  
  
He didn’t really know her. She came by sometimes and he thought she was really pretty. She would gush that he was so handsome and would take a Polaroid of him to ‘give to mama’. Four-year-old Yagami Shin appreciated that, wanting his mama to see his brand new Kimba shirt his dad got him or his new hat.   
  
That night, however, the woman was rubbing his dad’s back as he just…rocked. Shin would always remember how he was shivering, pale, his eyes glued open as he huddled under a blanket. The woman requested to see it so she could put a bandage on it but papa refused. On what?  
  
Shin was never…precisely privy to what that was about, only that it rendered his dad to that state for days. Whatever it was that happened, it absolutely shook the man. He refused to eat what the mystery woman and Yaya made him, he refused to sleep, he just…seemed frozen. Shin had cried.  
  
“Papa, are you dying like Kiba? You can’t.”  
  
His dad got him a fish once. He was blue and yellow, a pretty fish. Shin had happily named him Kiba but…fish were these short-lived creatures. Shin had gotten back from preschool and found his poor pet fish floating at the top of his little bowl and wondered what he was doing. Yaya had explained it carefully, saying that…everything living eventually died.  
  
Shin wasn’t sure what death looked like. It was a mystery to him as Kiba died while he was at school. He figured that…that for his dad to be acting like that, he must’ve been dying.  
  
Alas, Yagami Yamada snapped out of it, looking at him. Like whatever it was that happened, Shin didn’t know what it was he was thinking. Maybe he was coming back from death. However, he recalled how his dad wrapped his arms around him in that small two-bedroom apartment in Wasaba, their home alone, and held him for a long time. “I’m…I’m not going anywhere, son. I promise.”  
  
_Yagami Shin swallowed as they rode in silence to the bus station. It was June and it was time for the first step. He…was going to boot camp.  
  
There was no reason to have a funeral dirge for him at _this_ stage. Heck, if he got kicked out right here, they wouldn’t have to worry about any of it. However, he recognized he’d never been away from his family for longer than a week for school field trips since they all started to live together thirteen years ago. Half a year was…was a long time.   
  
He stole a glance at his dad in the front seat, twiddling his fingers. They got to ‘chit chat’ in the weeks that followed the man’s blowup. Nothing deep or meaningful and his dad made pointed effort to not mention anything about this. Shin…Shin really wanted to talk about it though, to tell the man where his head was at. Usually, he could, but…but this was the first time he felt like his dad was leaving him out here on his own.  
  
As Tony suggested, Jill came around some time back and just pleaded that he help but be ‘very careful’. Like Koji, he assured her that that was his intention. Really, everything was a presumption at this junction in his journey. For all he knew, he’d be designated to translation or communications. It…wouldn’t be his first choice but he wouldn’t mind intercepting enemy transmissions and interpreting them. Just so long as it helped the cause.  
  
…He hadn’t spoken to Lyla once since that night. He left a message last night saying he was leaving today but she never responded. He guessed he had let her down.  
  
Pulling up to the station, he gazed out at the other young men and women carrying the army subscribed duffel bags, also with their families. They all exited the vehicle in the same silence they rode over with. He…was feeling ill.  
  
“…Well, Shin, I don’t know what to say but good luck and be safe. Don’t let them bust your balls too hard” Koji finally offered, walking up to him and shaking his hand, “I’ll…try to hold down the fort in your absence.”  
  
“Thanks, Koji. I…I know you can” Shin smiled some, “Just keep that temper in check.”  
  
“Ha, right.”  
  
Yamada seemed to grimace a little. Yes, that ‘temper’ came from a place everyone knew about except Koji so it wasn’t a…solid topic. Nelly easily came in to divert it, “We’ll keep him out of trouble. Take care, bro.”  
  
“You too, Nelly.”  
  
“Nii-san, never be afraid to quit” Shaun said solemnly, zipping his hoodie up a little more.  
  
Shin couldn’t help but snicker. “Shaun, I don’t think that’s a lesson _any_ of us have ever taught you.”  
  
“Yea, brat” Koji leered, “Don’t make mom and dad question our parenting skills.”  
  
Their mom swatted at Koji with a smirk. Tony shuffled his feet, “Well, it’s…it’s the truth. I mean, don’t…don’t stay just because. If it’s not what you wanna do, don’t do it.”  
  
“Fair enough” Shin smiled, patting their heads, “I’ll keep that in mind.”  
  
Jill sniveled before rushing into his chest, wrapping her arms around his torso. “I’ll miss you, nii-san. Please call when you can.”  
  
“Of course, princess” he murmured, holding her tightly and kissing the top of her head.   
  
Yagami Dana came next, hugging him, “I can’t believe my Sweetie Plum is all grown up. I never imagined the day I’d have to let you go…”  
  
“Aww, mama, I’ll be back before you know it” he insisted, giving her a squeeze, “I love you.”  
  
“I love you too, Shin” she whispered, her eyes glittery.  
  
…Well. Stuffing his hands in his pockets, Shin glanced to his father. The man also had his hands in his pockets, looking up at nothing in particular in the sky. Yea, he…guessed that’s where they were going to leave it at, huh?  
  
“…Shin.”  
  
Oh. “…Yes, dad?”  
  
“…I told you I’d never be disappointed in you. I…have to say, for the past month, I’ve…probably been disappointed in you so I apologize for lying.”  
  
Jeez. “I understand, dad…”  
  
“However…” he mumbled, “…I…had a parent that did not support a single thing that I did for some ungodly reason and I swore I’d never do that. If anything, if…if she felt like this, I think I understand her a little better. However, I…I still have every reservation and disagreement with this decision but I…I’m going to spend this time trying to get a little more comfortable with the idea. You’ve…you’ve not once in your life led me to believe you would make poor decisions. I…I’m still proud of you, Shin, and…and I hope you find what you need to do here.”  
  
“…Thank you, dad” he rasped.  
  
The man gave him a hug and Shin felt relief. Damn, the man still didn’t agree but he was going to try, that…that was such a load off. He was going to be so distracted during basic training with that on his conscience but now he…he was clear and free.  
  
Smiling, waving at them as he put the duffel bag on his shoulder, he headed to board the bus, the officer advising five minutes to departure. Out of the corner of his eye, though, he saw a flash of pink disappear on the other side of the bus…  
  
…Maybe? Taking a detour, he rushed over and breathed out, “Lyla!”  
  
Sure enough, his best friend came to a stop, apparently trying to make an escape. Jeez. “H-Hey, Lyla.”  
  
She turned to him, her face completely expressionless. Dang. “C’mon, Lai, you came all this way, you…you could at least tell me ‘goodbye’, huh?”  
  
“…Bye.”  
  
Groaning, he got closer as she looked at her feet. “Lyla, I…I know you hate me for this but I…I’m going to help people in need. I…I feel this is my calling. Maybe things will change but…this is it right now. I…I want to make you proud, okay? You know, so…so you can tell your dad your ‘hafu’ best friend did something good.”  
  
Her eyes narrowed. Bleh. Shin walked closer and gave her a kiss on the cheek, giving her hand a little squeeze. “…I love you, Lyla. Take care.”  
  
He recalled he was just going to walk away to get on the bus, bothered but determined to show all of them this was worth it. That had been it. Lyla…caught his hand though.  
  
Shin had stopped, turning around to look back at her and ask what was wrong…instead, her lips pressed against his tenderly.   
  
She pulled away, her face so…sad. “…I love you too, Shin. And I’ll….I’ll never hate you and I’ll never let you have to prove anything to my father. Just…just be safe.”  
  
And she quickly walked back around toward where his family was standing to leave him there, stunned absolutely _senseless._  
  
He jolted when the bus horn honked and he quickly got up his bag, almost running onto the bus and settling in the middle seat. Everyone’s family was standing outside, waving and calling to their loved ones.   
  
…Shin nervously looked out and saw his family gesturing wildly, calling to him ‘safe travels’. He flushed as Lyla just looked at him solemnly.  
  
…Damn it. So much for a clear mind.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

 **End Notes:**   
  
So there’s a lot of references to Dirty here which is every bit a behemoth of a story. Like, that thing is a _monster_. It’s definitely not my compilation of Yume, Otome, and ENDGAME but that’s literally three stories. But, you get the general gist of it here. The only thing I’ll mention was the climactic chapter, or, one of them, was titled Duplicity in Faith. It’s technically where Yamada lost almost all of his.  
  
It’s so weird to finally get this portrayed because Yamada has called Dana ‘Seika’ in my head for so many years but it’s always in scenarios I imagine where they’re entirely alone. Also in scenarios I haven’t gotten to write yet because they’re just not…pressing. Alas, finally got it in there!  
  
Kaiten-zushi is like the sushi coming around on the conveyor belt and they charge you based on the plates/plate colors, I believe.  
  
So, when it comes to this universe’s politics, I _really_ want to detour from real world politics. However, as indicated in the last two chapters of ENDGAME, this Terran issue, based kind of off the Rune Factory series, is located in like Iraq area, which, of course, is where America keeps getting our nose all up in. But you’ll also recall the enemies are not Iraqi people but a conglomerate of nationalities with some genocidal tendencies using the desert as their backdrop. Which…probably still a little too close but we’ll cross that bridge when we get there.  
  
See ya’ll soon!  
  



	4. Unforgotten

**Nomad,** Shin’s Story  
**Chapter 4** : Unforgotten

Author’s Note: Hello, all. Man, has it not been…crazy? Like, I have lived through some stuff, ya’ll. 9/11 had us suspecting terrorism in every domain, we had anthrax in the mail scares, my area, the DMV as we call it, had _snipers_ taking people out at random—the economic collapse, the swine flu, the bird flu…  
  
I would never…have expected us to be a point in history where we’re basically confined indoors because we possibly may be infected by a super virus that most of us can’t be tested for but have to treat like we DO have it because it takes _two weeks_ to show up. This is…fiction level nonsense but we’re living it.  
  
So, I will not mention it again. It’s scary enough and I know people have high anxiety—I have it to a point but I am also incredibly laid back. I’m taking it seriously but also taking it day by day. That’s really all we can do at this point. So, in which case, I’ll start queuing chapters for this again so I can get back to my SttF Remaster.

As mentioned last chapter, from here forward, this story transforms into the most sexual thing I’ve written somehow? Like, it’s very blunt and crazy, which, dang, this is _Shin_. This is supposed to be the calm guy! But, well, SttF also seems to be heading that way too. **TLDR: SMUT ABOUND. TREAD CAREFULLY.**  
  


Also, again, not a necessary read for this story but some knowledge of my story Dirty appears all throughout. I try to handhold a bit though. I actually have to update it based off of this too, some elements don’t hold true anymore.  
  
That’s all, folks. The release schedule should be Wednesday and Saturday until we’re caught up to what I’ve written. I’m…halfway done. Enjoy!

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  


_“Damn it.”  
  
Shin tapped the wall near the phones issued for them to be allowed to make calls. He got three phone calls a week for fifteen minutes. Apparently it was designed to get them used to not being able to speak to people for long spans of time other than fellow soldiers. It was a little…traumatizing at first, given he talked to his siblings every day. And there was no way he was going to be able to speak to all five of them and his parents in fifteen minutes. He…managed it but it wasn’t great.  
  
However, at least three minutes of that time was spent trying to get in touch with Lyla.  
  
He’d call her house. They apparently got wise on some ‘new tech’ called ‘caller ID’ and were now screening to not answer him. Okay. So, unfortunately, that was literally the only number he had. And it was DRIVING HIM CRAZY.  
  
He tried. He tried to tell himself a kiss on the lips didn’t mean anything or it didn’t have to. Maybe she was just feeling particularly affectionate.  
  
But nope, it was different. It felt different, it…it felt like a girl that liked him a little differently kissed him and he was…  
  
…He was confused? Sure, it’d been suggested numerous times but he really just thought Lyla was, like…affectionate with him in general! He slipped sometimes too, but it…it hadn’t been his intention, right?  
  
“Moshi, moshi, nii-san” Koji sang in a mock-cheery voice.  
  
“Stop it. Have-have you seen Lyla?”  
  
“Since I spoke to you three days ago? Nope. She’s away at school, Shin, I don’t even know where the shithole teaching her to be a wife is. I’ll do some research once I get a fall break but right now, I’m slammed, dude.”  
  
Shin rubbed his forehead, sighing, “I know, I know. I…I just don’t get it, Koji. I know what you’ve said for years but for you to end up right??”  
  
“Seriously?” Koji snickered before also sighing, “Shin, look at it from her perspective: here you come, this guy with a family and a family you show you care about. You extend this caring to her, let her eat with us, cook her favorite meals, make sure she gets to go places she wants, open the door to her wearing the clothes she might want to wear sometimes, provide her security in her feelings—fuck, explain SEX to her. You’re her…rock or something, dude. Of course she might be into you.”  
  
“Her ROCK? Sh-she’s gone weeks without talking to me and-and Parsley! She was ready to marry him!”_

_  
Luckily he was last and everyone that could be waiting on the phone were back in their bunkroom, not listening in on this. Seriously, he would rather be sharing a bed with Nelly and Koji than sharing the same space as some of these guys but he…guessed he had to get used to that. All the same, he had a hard time NOT exclaiming. Koji scoffed, “Parsley was the easy way out, man. And, the reason she’s so dour is, even if you ARE her rock, she knows she can’t have you.”  
  
…What? “I-I don’t know if I’d say all THAT—I mean, I-I now have to consider if I could think of more with her. I-I just never gave it a fair shot, I suppose.”  
  
“Shin, you can have a complete turn around and want her all you want too but Okamoto Bajiru made it clear years ago we’re not a ‘fit’ family for his daughter. Parsley…was a promising potential for what Bajiru is willing to accept as her husband_. _I think you’re doing a brave thing, man, but…you’re not going to be breaking the bank on this route.”  
  
“…Wow.”  
  
“I mean, I’ve looked into it, Shin, it’s kind of sad. If ol’ Bajiru needs you netting 500k a year, bro—”  
  
“I GET IT, Koji” Shin gritted, “I’m about to be a poor ass hafu who’s career might include me getting killed. I am not prime pickings.”  
  
“That’s all material though, Shin. I…I honestly do believe Lyla needs emotional support more. She’s…she’d been told she’s not good enough her entire life, told that she’s ugly or basically a whore for showing off her damn ankles. I think you’re going to be comfortable and successful, Shin, but…Lyla most likely needs you to do what you’ve always done.”  
  
… “That’s if that kiss meant what I’ve been fretting it does anyway” Shin breathed.  
  
“Well, it’s been, what? Two weeks? Just five and a half months until you can find out.”  
  
Great._

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
_“Yagami!”  
  
Shin…was in good shape. Or he thought he was in good shape. He excelled in gym and even did track and field club in school sometimes. HOWEVER, when he and his fellow applicants got here, he realized he was…in moderate shape.  
  
He breathed, reminding himself that a pull up wasn’t only in the arms but the shoulders, and managed to pull himself up a fourth time. The drill sergeant had come to possibly yell at him for taking too long. “YAGAMI.”  
  
“Y-Yes, drill sergeant?” he almost choked, dropping to get his fifth and final one.  
  
“Do you know that your time has only improved by fifteen seconds?”  
  
“Y-Yes, sir.”  
  
He shook his head, going over to bellow at someone else. While Shin wasn’t a hundred percent sure, he knew there was SOME resentment that he was here? He’d heard someone advise another that he was ‘Yagada’s son’ or ‘I heard his dad’s a really popular doctor’. In other words, what was this rich kid doing here? Shin wasn’t sure why it mattered but it led to the drill sergeant advising him he had only improved his time of doing pull ups by fifteen seconds. Finishing his last one, he dropped and breathed, billowing his sweaty shirt away from his chest to fan himself. When he first got here, it took him about five minutes to finish the reps and now it took him a minute, five seconds. Fifteen seconds was improvement from his training last week.  
  
Running to go pull himself up a rope, Shin shook his head. He felt no reason to advise that his family had to pull themselves out of the mud to get to where they were. He wasn’t here to prove he was a hardworking person from a wealthy family but to prove he was the right person to help.  
  
“Must be popular back home, Yagami.”  
  
Later that night, Shin was scrubbing his boots, startled when a sergeant came in with a box of mail and dropped a rather large stack of envelopes on his bunk. Oh. “Thank you, sergeant.”  
  
The man just nodded, handing a few envelopes up to Shin’s bunkmate before heading on.  
  
“Have a ton of girlfriends back home, Yagami?”  
  
Shin snorted, dropping back against his pillow and kicking the underneath of the bunk above him. Aden Bjerke was his bunkmates name. “Bjerke, not Bjork” he had groaned when he introduced himself to Shin. He told Shin his family was originally from North Dakota in the U.S. where his dad was a sergeant or colonel before they transferred here about three years ago because his dad was going to be based in the Japanese U.S. military camp. Just so happened, Aden signed up just as his parents were being sent back to the states. ‘Could’ve transferred but my girl signed up here and she means to stay.’  
  
He was a nice guy. Shin had pretty much lost all the friends he had in school because of this venture, the few he had telling him this wasn’t an ‘honorable’ taking of his time. Yea, yea, whatever. It had hurt a little but, well, he was feeling okay making some new companions here.  
  
“I told you, not that sort of guy” Shin murmured.  
  
It seemed like such a strange thing to get a letter. He’d never gotten one, actually, since everyone was near him anyway. He smiled, finding that three of them were from the youngest so maybe they’d been excited to send them. Nelly and Koji apparently tag-teamed a letter as had his mom and dad…he actually held his breath, flipping to the very last one in the stack. Exhaling, his heart started to beat a bit faster to see it was from Lyla. He’d been here two and a half months now and…and he hadn’t talked to her yet.  
  
While he…still wasn’t certain where they were at, he…he really wanted to save Lyla’s for last. He opened Jill’s first. Her bubbly handwriting was almost popping off the page and it made him smile. Alas, digging into the letter at hand, he found his eyes closing some as she advised she thought a particular boy or something was cute but Koji had ‘meanly threatened him’. Good. If any boyfriend was to be gotten at this young an age for her, he wanted to be a part of the screening. Frowning, he looked around before retrieving a notebook he had brought out of his trunk. He supposed he could answer as he read…_  
  
_Next was Tony and he had to go slightly revise Jill’s after because he also talked about a girl he liked but Shin hadn’t had even slightly the same visceral response. Fine, he was protective of his baby sister but he didn’t want to be a hypocrite. He told her instead of ‘don’t meet any boys’ to just…practice caution. Lot of bad seeds out there and just MAYBE he recommended he meet them first.  
  
Sighing, he tapped his pen to his forehead as he read Shaun’s. Shaun was still the youngest…but what a weird kid. He was jumping from talking about Digimon, an anime he liked, to the psychological effects of warfare within like the spans of a paragraph. Shin told him Digimon sounded cool and…thanks for his concern about his mental welfare?  
  
He smirked some, his brows raising as Nelly and Koji’s ‘letter’ was literally pulled out pages from a porno magazine because what the hell was wrong with those guys? Absently looking at Koji’s self-declared and TMI favorite adult actress, Jenna Jameson, he sighed. Only them. He hid the X-rated material back in the envelope and read the letter which wasn’t much better, the two apparently honestly thinking they were helping him since he probably hadn’t seen anything ‘sexy’ in months. Well, no, but seriously. He advised them to get their minds out of the gutter but he MAY appreciate it.  
  
Aww, his mama. She sent him a letter that almost sounded frantic, asking if she needed to send him toiletries or new undergarments and towels. While they were provided soap, he…did have a bougie moment and asked if she could send the shampoo and conditioner he used back home in travel size. The stuff they gave here made his scalp burn.  
  
Finally, he looked to his dad’s. It looked like he’d scribbled stuff out a zillion times. He had the feeling his dad hadn’t written many letters at all in his life. Once there was actual writing, his dad asked how he was doing and general questions before relaying that the whole family now had cell phones so he could reach whomever individually. What? Even the kids? That was nuts! Dad went on to request that Shin try to call them after seven if he could so the call was unlimited and wouldn’t eat up minutes. He gave a list of everyone’s phone number and told him as long as he wasn’t in surgery, he could pick up now. It…had been tough getting his dad on the phone.  
  
…Okay. Carefully opening Lyla’s letter, he frowned.  
  
_Dear Shin,  
  
How are you? Is it different there? I worry about you but I know you’re probably in decent spirits. Things are about the same here. I’m in a dormitory with one other girl and we’re currently learning ikebana which I actually really enjoy. I think you were right, I could have gone into something like that, I bet. You have very good insight, Shin. _  
  
He snorted. If that were the case, her kissing him wouldn’t have come out of nowhere. He smiled softly when she told him about some of the new music she was listening to. Before he left, he dropped off his portable CD player to her in their secret jungle which she apparently took with her. She wrote that she absolutely loved the new Red Hot Chili Peppers album Californication. She said she couldn’t wait to listen to it with him…  
  
…Not one mention of the kiss but he didn’t much mind. He…he honestly was happy just to hear from her. She left her dorm address and he…he was going to spend a little time wording a response to her.  
  
…Maybe for her, he was trying to prove himself._

_  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX_

He shot a gun today.  
  
One of his dad’s friends taught him how to use one when they were Wasaba…and that was saying something given Shin left when he was five. He never told his dad because the man abhorred guns, often saying they were just tools for death. Shin held it, shivering in the early October morning. It was freezing but they wanted them used to various elements.  
  
June through September, they went through the first phase. He had to learn how to clean, assemble, disassemble, and hold the gun. At first it seemed weird to spend three months on something so mundane but he quickly came to realize it was probably the most important part. Not only did they learn upkeep, they learned what position to hold it, and how to align. After, they learned…how to breathe.  
  
That caught Shin a little off guard. They were informed that when you pulled the trigger, you hold your breath. ‘Breathing will change how the bullet is directed’. Really? Not only that, but they did not ‘pull’ the trigger, they ‘squeezed’ it. It…actually was a bit of an ordeal getting it down.  
  
But now? Now, they got to shoot them.  
  
“I hear lighter eyes give poorer vision, Yagami.”  
  
Shin somehow couldn’t help his ‘lighter eyes’ from cutting toward the instructor as he aimed toward the targets ahead of him. The man had been snide from the get-go with him and Shin found it quite irritating. Alas, keeping his voice level, he nodded, “I’ve heard the same, sir.”  
  
His father had said he was surprised to learn that fact, given his vision had always been stellar. He naturally took them to get it checked every year to be sure…  
  
There were a lot of things Shin missed. He missed cues with his brother being sick, he missed cues with his parents sometimes—he _definitely_ missed them with Lyla. However? As Koji would sometimes remark snidely, ‘in exchange for shitty life experiences, we get a lot of perks’. Shin held his breath and aimed, shooting 35 out of 40 targets. One or two were missed because he breathed.  
  
The instructor stared, wide eyed, as Shin stood, wearing all of his gear as that was part of the training. Yagami Yamada had been a little surprised when Shin continually got very close to 20/10 vision. Not _quite_ but close enough. A…Yagami perk, he supposed. Shin internally rolled his eyes when the man demanded he ‘do it again’ to make sure it wasn’t a fluke. Fine.  
  
He got 36 that time which, ‘unfortunately’ for the instructor, placed him somewhere at an expert level. It definitely wasn’t just vision, no, he had prior knowledge and some slight upkeep when he went to his high school friend’s shooting range. But boy was that instructor pissed. Why? Why was it so alarming he could be good at things?  
  
Frustrated when he was advised to go run some laps for no given reason but being told to do so, Shin ran the mile before hitting the showers. Some of the other guy’s gave him questioning looks so God only knows what that jerk said about him in his absence. Aden came out of the telephone room as it was call day and snorted. “He said you were just some rich fucking kid with something to prove and that your excelling came from your ‘privilege’.”  
  
“I run a mile in a solid amount of time now because I’ve been forced to run a mile for _four months straight._ I’m proficient at pullups because, _again_ , that’s what we’ve done for _four months straight_. I fell _flat on my face_ when we first climbed the rope _four months ago_ , now I can _climb the rope”_ Shin listed off, glaring, “Am I missing the point of doing these exercises, Aden? Should I still be struggling after _four months_? What amount of privilege am I using staying here and actually improving?”  
  
Aden snorted, “They’re idiots, Shin. Their suggested privilege, you would have either bought yourself through this or had daddy call to get you out of it with a donation, neither of which has occurred. You have the privilege of an able body which is a blessing.”  
  
…Yea. A little…defeated all the same, he waited for his name to be called for the phone call. He…he wasn’t sure he wanted to call him given how he felt about this in the first place but…he might know what he’s going through.  
  
Shin sat down with the piece of paper sent to him some months ago, dialing in the number, and praying he picked up. It was okay if he didn’t, there were tons of good reasons he wouldn’t, but…  
  
“Hello?”  
  
But thank God. “…Hey, dad.”  
  
“Shin, it’s good to hear from you. How are you holding up?” Yagami Yamada replied.

  
…Meh. “Um, okay, dad. Sort of…”  
  
He imagined his dad was probably _praying_ he find a reason to quit this. No, he wasn’t going to quit, just… “What’s the matter, son?”  
  
“I…I was really struggling the first month, y’know, dad? I mean, I did well in gym and I’ve always been in good shape but the exertion is different here, y’know?”  
  
“Of course.”  
  
“So…so I worked at it. Like, I toned myself up, I got my time down. I’ve been here four months, I ought to improve some, right?”  
  
Shin imagined his father nodding, “Doing the same thing daily, I would imagine so. What’s the issue?”  
  
Clearing his throat, he tapped his fingers against the metallic table the phone was situated on, “…I did really well on the shooting range today. 36 out of 40. Expert level. You…you know, the good vision?”  
  
“Mm…”  
  
“So, um, my instructor actually made me shoot twice to make sure it wasn’t a fluke and I got one more than before so…he made me run laps and apparently told the rest of the squad I was getting by on the privilege of my ‘rich upbringing’.”  
  
His father actually scoffed, “ _Hardly_?”  
  
Shin smirked, “Dad…”  
  
“Shin, you could ask the most hardened criminal from the poorest slums to run that same course. They might have areas they have experience in but that circumstance doesn’t automatically make them weaker or stronger in that area. As such, just because you had a ‘rich upbringing’ doesn’t mean you don’t know how to work hard and succeed. Granted, I get what they’re suggesting because usually that rich upbringing would keep you from being there but the fact that you’re riding this out is probably confusing them, let alone the fact you’re _good_ at it.”  
  
“…Mm.”  
  
“I’m still not on board with this, Shin, to be honest. However, I’m a hundred percent behind you proving naysayers wrong so you hang in there” Yamada said dryly.  
_  
_ Shin snickered, rubbing his face. Figures. “Thanks, dad.”

  
“And stop fudging those numbers too.”  
  
Making a face, Shin leaned back in the chair and pouted, “I _wasn’t_. I really missed those four. I…well, you haven’t shot a gun but when you’re aiming you’re supposed to hold your breath.”  
  
“Yea.”  
  
“So I…I really kind of have trouble with that part. I-I want to breathe.”  
  
“…Well, you need to work on that then.”  
  
Shin’s eyes widened, startled by the brisk tone his father suddenly had. _What_? He thought they were cool! What was his problem?! “I _will_. I guess I just can’t expect _anyone_ to think I can learn something, huh?”  
  
“You’re not going to have a chance to think about how much you want to breathe when you have to eliminate someone looking to kill you.”  
  
Shin froze.  
  
_“That’s_ what I don’t think you’ve learned, Shin. I don’t think you’ve learned that whatever they think they’re preparing you for, they’re _not_. You’re playing wargames with simulated situations, shortcuts, and outcomes. You will not have set circumstances when you go over there, Shin. You’re shooting a piece of paper with a static target and missing four because you’re breathing and they’re calling you an ‘expert’ because of it. There’s…there’s not a human being that can _prepare_ for that, Shin. It’s not possible and…and I don’t agree with rolling the dice on if you can or not.”  
  
Pressing his lips together, Shin balled his fist. This… “I get it, dad. I get it. You just can’t believe in me.”  
  
“Shin--”  
  
“I have to go. I’ll talk to you later.”  
  
Hanging up for the first time in his life on his father, he marched angrily back to his bunk and went to bed without another word. He had been almost Koji-level mad that day and then proceeded to not speak to his dad for the remainder of that month and the next. He had been ‘through’ trying to explain to people he could do this.  
  
Funny thing was, he guessed that was another Yagami ‘perk’: stubbornness.

He stubbornly didn’t want to admit that Yagami Yamada did have a point.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
_“Oh, Sweetie Plum, won’t you talk to your papa?”  
  
Shin yawned into the back of his hand before smiling vaguely. He wondered why his mama still called him ‘Sweetie Plum’ after all this. He was the only one with a nickname like that too. “I’ll be home in a week, mama. I imagine he still lives there, right?”  
  
“Oh, of course he does” she huffed, “…It would break my heart if this splintered you two, Shin. I understand you have to do what’s right but…but I do love your father and I couldn’t stand to see you two not talking.”  
  
Honestly, Shin was being petty. He got over what his dad said probably two days later entirely. The man was genuinely right. They could run a whole lot of scenarios and do a whole lot of strength tests and target shooting here but not one thing was going to prepare anyone for someone also trained and prepared to kill them the exact same way they were supposed to be prepared to kill them. The problem? Shin was prepared to roll those dice and he knew his dad had been through enough to want to stay on the safe side of things. He respected that…but his dad wasn’t going to back down from his standpoint and Shin wasn’t going to back down from his. Phone conversations weren’t going to go any better as long as they were at that point.  
  
“That’ll be on dad’s behalf if it occurs, mama. I…I would never want to stop talking to dad, no matter how tense it gets. I just think for now it’s more comfortable if we just don’t really talk while I’m here. It’s not a topic we agree on and I guess we just haven’t had many of those to learn how to properly handle it.”  
  
“Mm, that’s a good point…” she murmured.  
  
Shin sat up, clearing his throat, “U-Um, on another topic, mama, have…have you happened to see Lyla or her mom since I left?”  
  
“I actually saw Lillian at a party recently. I was able to get to her while her ball and chain was off chatting with his cohorts to ask how she was doing” Dana explained, “She seemed in the average humdrum spirits. I asked about Lyla and she assured she was ‘making it’.”  
  
Damn it. “That is not comforting.”  
  
“No…perhaps on your way back, stop in and check on her, sweetie. I know for a fact no one has gone to see her except your brothers.”  
  
What now? “Koji said it was like trying to get into a fort to see her and he could only speak to her for a few moments. Nelly also tried it with minimal success. The idea is to keep unrelated men at bay, if you will.”  
  
“Then how will I?” he whispered.  
  
“Hmm, we’ll hope for some miracle, sweetie plum. I haven’t given up on her having the life she wants. I…I hate to see a young woman go through what I had to.”  
  
Shin nodded grimly, “I…I agree.”  
  
“Well, you head on to bed, sweetie. I’ll see you soon.”  
  
“Okay…before you go though, mama, just curious: what makes me the ‘sweetie plum’?”  
  
“Have you met your brothers?”  
  
He laughed, shaking his head, “I can’t disagree but I don’t know if I’m that much better in the sweetness range.”  
  
“I know it’s embarrassing but…you are my first baby, you know? I…I called you that before you were born and I…I was forced to miss a lot of your baby years. I just guess it might be a connection to the time I lost. I’ll try to stop.”  
  
“…You don’t have to stop at all, mama. Really, just wondered. I love you.”  
  
“Love you too, Shin. And your papa did want me to tell you to ‘keep giving them hell’, whatever that means.”  
  
Shin smiled, rubbing his eyes a bit, “Tell him I will and thank you…and…and that I love him too. G’night, mama.”  
  
“Good night, sweetie.”  
  
…Nothing…could prepare him for what he could face. Not a damn bit of training was going to make him a hundred percent ready for what he might face on that other side.  
  
…All he could have was…knowing what was at stake here. That was it. Many before him had the exact same thing and it still didn’t matter, just…  
  
He’d roll the dice.  
  
_“You want this old rickety thing, kid?”  
  
Shin looked up, shocked. “Huh?”  
  
Where he had been based only really had a small town around it. While they could leave base on the weekend, it would take at least five hours to get anywhere fun or worth going and that same time to get home. Thus, he and a majority of the other privates did not really…leave base. On occasion but probably only a handful.

That was a mistake. When Shin did finally leave after the completion ceremony, it was like he was walking onto a new planet. The sounds, the smells, the people—he felt like an alien. Aden was waiting for his girlfriend to come pick him up so he walked around the small town with him. Shin…actually hadn’t thought about how he was going to get home. He guessed he could call Koji.  
  
Of course, they had wandered into an old consignment shop type place with all sorts of knickknacks. Shin had meandered through the jewelry and did a doubletake seeing a vintage Chanel bracelet for fifty gold pieces. He had told himself there was no way it was real before picking it up and…being blown away that it was _very much_ real unless his mother-given skillset of recognizing real jewelry was rusty. He slowly walked over and asked if maybe a zero had rubbed off but the man shrugged. _“Just some old crap jewelry. 50 pieces.”  
  
_It was _worth 200 times that_. Aden also was very confused, directing Shin to look at some art and…mind, it was a _small_ painting but it looked like a very authentic Picasso. Art was very easy to forge though…but Shin wasn’t certain when he found a very much genuine first edition version of The Tale of Genji scroll for _10 pieces. “Just a shitty piece of paper.”  
  
_Shin could…sort of understand if the man was a foreigner but he wasn’t. Maybe since he was in the middle of this town without internet connection or apparently a library, he didn’t know how valuable these things were. Shin wanted to give him…at least a little more but the man said him simply, ‘what it’s worth’. Oh…okay.  
  
Now they had wandered into the ‘scrap metal’ yard. There was _super_ valuable stuff in here too but nothing Shin had ever been intrigued by. Until he saw this motorbike, a 72’ Honda XL250. He stared at it, wondering who just dropped it off. Something had to be wrong with it…  
  
Then the fellow came and asked if he wanted this ‘old rickety thing’. _What_? “U-Um, does…does it run?”  
  
“Yea, might need some maintenance. Some dude dropped it off for a quick thousand last week for pachinko.”  
  
…What. “And…you’re asking?”  
  
“2000.”  
  
…So, Shin started it up to prove to himself this was crazy. It was sputtering a bit but otherwise, just perfect. Shin slowly gave him the money and asked where he could purchase some oil.  
  
“I talked with that dude.”  
  
Aden was sitting on the dirt ground on top of his duffel bag on the outskirts where he was going to be picked up. He said his girlfriend was coming in a truck so they could take him until they started going toward the airport. Shin mapped it and found it was going in the general direction he needed so he agreed. Currently, he was fixing up his new investment, shivering a bit in the cold air. He briefly glanced at Aden before drawling, “You mean the dude I just bought priceless things from for a whopping 2060 pieces?”  
  
“Yea. He said it’s his dad’s old shop—or more like a family owned shop, right? He wants nothing to do with it but his other siblings are adamant they keep it and have shamed him into feeling responsible. So he said he’s been stuck here for thirty years doing what he doesn’t want to do. No matter how low he prices stuff, the locals keep the place afloat. Y’know, on top of the family owning the building. That’s why he was like that: he doesn’t want to be there.”  
  
Shin frowned at that, spinning a wrench the man in question gave him for free, “…But you know the worth of things regardless, Aden. I was supposed to be a _doctor_ , man, and I didn’t want to. That doesn’t mean I go start committing malpractice just because I don’t want to do it. I mean, that’s just embarrassing at that point what that guy’s doing. I have millions of gold pieces in my duffel bag right now, man.”  
  
Shaking his head, Aden groaned, “…Yea. If that stuff _is_ legit, he could sell the shit and have _other_ people run this place. Some people are real shortsighted.”  
  
Mm. Well, that Shin knew a little bit about in a few different regards. Sitting on the bike, he drove it a little ways up the path before wheeling back around to Aden. It wasn’t exactly the _smoothest_ ride but a classic Honda like this? It was awesome. Aden smirked, rubbing his hands together. “Man, are you going to ride that thing the rest of the way home? You’ll have got through basic training and died of pneumonia in your mansion.”  
  
Shin snickered, turning the bike off but remaining on the back. “I’m going to ride it to see my friend, Lyla, but I’ll probably just take a bus back to Hondo and ride it to the house.”  
  
“You gonna be okay carrying all your stuff?”  
  
Oh yea…Shin played with it for a little while, managing to get everything into his duffel bag and strapping it on the front. He didn’t really have _that_ much stuff so it shouldn’t be too front heavy. Just having figured out his game plan, he looked up when an old Jeep Gladiator suddenly rounded the corner. Aden stood, grinning a bit as it came to a stop beside him. Shin was a little startled to see a pink-haired woman behind the wheel, wearing fatigues. “Jeez, did they post you up in enough of a Hickville?”  
  
“Probably where they send the unsavory types” Aden joked, walking over to the driver’s side. “How was it in good ol’ Okinawa?”  
  
“Probably _too_ much fun” she droned, giving him a kiss, “I thought about driving down here a few times but I wouldn’t have made it back to base in time. I missed you.”  
  
Aden hugged her shoulder, kissing her temple, “You too, babe. I can’t wait to get to a nice hot shower and fucking.”  
  
Shin smirked, raising a brow, as she swatted at Aden, “Such a prick. You better get me dinner first, dumbass.”  
  
“Always! Sonja, I told you about my buddy here, Yagami Shin. Shin, this is my girl, Sonja Piehl.”  
  
“Nice to meet you” Shin bowed.  
  
“Hey, same! Aden said you were gonna ride with us a ways so hop in!”  
  
Thanking her, Shin settled his bike into the bed of the truck and raised a brow when Aden slid into the middle seat. “I mean, dude, I’m the third wheel, I can ride the middle.”  
  
“No offense, Shin, but I’ve been nestled next to men for the last six months, I need a break” Aden laughed.  
  
Oh yea, that might be awkward anyway. Sonja smirked widely, shifting the truck in gear and taking a u-turn, “Dunno how you put up with him as your bunkmate for half a year, Yagami-san, I can barely do it and he’s my boyfriend.”  
  
“He was a handful” Shin teased.  
  
Aden scoffed, turning on the radio. _“Somebody once told me the world is gonna roll me; I ain’t the sharpest tool in the shed.”  
  
_“My sister says this is _all_ they play in the states right now” Sonja groaned.  
  
Shin and his siblings didn’t generally listen to pop. Well, the younger kids did but he just put on milder rock if he was driving with them, not…this. He raised a brow, questioning his English understanding at first or if these were some hamfisted metaphors. _‘We can all use a little change’.  
  
_“Do ya’ll believe these Y2K rumors?” Sonja asked along the way.  
  
“That we’re about to hit a technological apocalypse? Doubt it” Aden shrugged, “A new millennium though. Wonder what’s in store.”  
  
…Yea. He’d been away from home for half a year now. What…was he about to walk in to?  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
There were days of note in everyone’s lives. Good or bad, they left some sort of impression in the memory. Shin would say that, after having a good journey with Aden and Sonja, that that day had been one of those days.  
  
They stopped just a little ways from Tokyo which was about two hours from Subami, give or take twenty minutes. It was about a thirty minute drive from the small ‘lady’s school’ Lyla was supposed to be at. Shin went and shook both of their hands, thanking them. _“Call and tell me when you get to the states, Aden. And let me know where you two end up posted.”  
  
“Will do, bro. Hopefully fate will put us back in the same place.”  
  
_Hopefully. Shin hadn’t considered the fact they might not cross paths again…  
  
They waited for him to boot up the bike one more time to make sure they weren’t leaving him stranded. It started like a dream, like it had just been waiting for this moment. Shin waved as he zipped off west at around 3 o’clock that afternoon. He…would be lying to say he wasn’t excited to see her.  
  
It felt ever so slightly warmer in this direction but that wasn’t saying much. If he hadn’t had his thick army parka, he may have died by now, he groaned in his head. And to know he probably couldn’t go in somewhere to warm up briefly wasn’t very pleasant...  
  
He stopped to verify in front of a large brick building. It sort of looked like a campus, several other similar buildings lined up symmetrically behind it. Looking at the map, he frowned and glanced up to find some sort of sign. Lady Margaret’s School of Wifeliness. His eyes almost rolled into the back of his head. This was crazy.  
  
Parking his bike, Shin wandered around before being struck that he saw…absolutely no one? Like, not a soul, literally. He knocked at the administration building’s door and…nothing. It was a Thursday, it seemed a little…unusual to be closed.  
  
Okay. So, Lyla had written her dorm number on her letters so he could start there. Wandering to the building, he looked around. Mm, he would have to go in and he didn’t want to alarm anyone. Damn.  
  
_Mother, mother: how’s the family? I’m just calling to say ‘hello’. How’s the weather? How’s my father? Am I lonely? Heavens, no.  
  
_Hmm? Shin raised a brow, looking up when he heard the song in the near distance. Readjusting his duffel bag, he followed the sound. Just maybe…  
  
_When you sent me off to see the world, were you scared that I might get hurt? Would I try a little tobacco? Would I keep on hiking up my skirt?  
  
_Shin couldn’t help smile though Okamoto Lyla had her face to her knees, his old CD player in her hands, sitting on an old wooden bench. _I’m hungry. I’m dirty. I’m losing my mind…everything’s fine! I’m freezing. I’m starving. I’m bleeding to death. Everything’s fine!  
  
_“Dramatic much, Lai?”  
  
She squealed, leaping to her feet. Her hair seemed a little bit longer than last he saw her but same ol’ Lyla. Her green eyes suddenly filled with tears. “OhmyGod, Shin.”  
  
He pouted, setting his things down and holding his arms out where she pretty much barreled into his chest. Hugging her tightly, he sighed, “Sorry. You probably have all the reason to be dramatic.”  
  
“I-I’ve missed you so much” she rasped, embracing his neck, “A-And I thought I-I wouldn’t get to see you.”  
  
“Oh, I would never let it get that crazy” Shin assured, holding her waist as he looked around, “I mean, where is everyone? Are you here by yourself?”  
  
Lyla sighed, resting her ear against his chest, “It’s a Catholic school so Christmas is very important. They closed the school so everyone went home…except me.”  
  
Shin frowned, confused, “Why?”  
  
“…Well, father didn’t really want me to. He…he said he wasn’t going to be able to send anyone out here just because the school closes for the month.”  
  
Son of a bitch. “…Are you able to eat? Are there cooks here?”  
  
“Mm, they…they left me some supplies but probably not much to last past this weekend. I don’t blame them, they…they really thought everyone was going to go home, that it was in the agreement.”  
  
Shin’s eyes narrowed and he released her, “Well then, _naturally,_ you’re coming home with me. I’m not leaving you here to fend for yourself because your dad can’t be bothered.”  
  
“Oh Shin, papa might see me…” she sighed gravely.  
  
“So? Let him” he snorted, “The Yagami _can_ be ‘bothered’ and he can be mad about it.”  
  
Lyla smirked at him, her eyes closing some, “You haven’t gone off and become a hothead too, have you?”  
  
Snickering, he picked his bag up, “Maybe just a _tiny_ bit. C’mon though, I’m serious. You have a backpack?”  
  
“Yes…”  
  
“Grab some clothes and throw it in there. Or, if you really don’t want to, I’ll set my tent up out here and we can forage.”  
  
She pouted at him before looking around, waving him on. “C’mon, so you can warm up.”  
  
While he was reluctant, wondering how they really could just leave one student here all by themselves, Shin followed her to her dorm. She apparently had the keys to both the entrance and her own room which was down a long hallway of other doors. It had been years since he saw Lyla’s room back home. Alas, entering this one, he knew this was _not_ how she kept it…  
  
It was so sterile. White sheets. White blankets. White walls. There wasn’t a single decoration anywhere and her clothes were neatly in her closet. It felt…really awkward. Looking around, he drawled, “I…take it your roommate is a neat freak?”  
  
“Hmm? Oh no, her name’s Reiko and she’s actually super sweet and would love to put up some pictures. We’re not allowed to though, it’s unseemly” she explained, getting something out of a drawer.  
  
Shoot him. “Lai…”  
  
She hummed as she settled some clothes in her bag, “How was it though, Shin? Did you have fun?”  
  
“Definitely wasn’t summer camp” he laughed, leaning against the doorway. “…Well, guess I wasn’t allowed to decorate either.” Just he went to join the army.  
  
She bundled up tight per his suggestion, putting on the backpack because there wasn’t going to be a more comfortable way. She sulked when they got out to his motorbike. “Those are dangerous, Shin.”  
  
“You can wear the helmet” he assured, setting his duffel bag back where it had been.  
  
“That’s not the point!”  
  
He blinked at her languidly, drawling, “Well, we can sit here and discuss some things then. Like that kiss from when I left.”  
  
“Give me the helmet.”  
  
Uh huh. Shin smirked, giving her the safety mechanism, kicking the bike into gear. She hugged his waist tight and he revved it up before zooming up the road. Figured. He had asked in the letter, actually, about it because he wanted to know if it meant anything in particular. His best friend literally wrote back ‘nothing in particular’ and went on about a whole other topic. ‘Nothing particular’, his foot.  
  
But, well…that could be conversation for later.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
“Mm, this is nice, Shin.”  
  
Shin munched on chips, lying in bed, as they watched a game show. Man, he just missed the simple things like this. Going to bed when he felt like it too…though he was starting to feel a wee bit drowsy.  
  
As they were driving, it started to snow heavily and he didn’t trust himself to navigate safely. So, he found them a hotel and called his mom from there to advise he had to stop due to the weather. She had offered to come get them but he assured they’d be fine until the morning.  
  
So, things felt awesome when they were walking around the little city, looking at the storefronts. Lyla was delighted to see all the lights and décor, grasping his hand and dragging him around. It…was like old times. Except, he noted, people were giving him a weird eye. He…was still wearing his camouflage. He probably looked like a foreigner.  
  
_“Shin, you know you got taller, right?”  
  
“What? No, I didn’t.”  
  
_Lyla had said that when they went into a store so she could try on some strappy heels. He thought they were pretty cute, paying the shopkeeper while she was looking around to have them sent to their hotel secretly. Alas, Lyla had come near him and still was only to his shoulder. He hadn’t really thought he was that much taller but, at Lyla’s behest, had the shopkeeper measure him. 185 cm. He had only been 180 when he left. He was six feet tall now, wow.  
  
Lyla had giggled when they sat down for dinner at a hibachi place, just…delighted. They sat by the window and could see the whole city aglow like she was. He had smiled, in the back of his head thinking he hoped he could put a smile on her face this whole time. It…sounded like she’d gone from one prison to another.  
  
Around nine, they went back to the hotel and she went to the onsen for women while he went to the men’s. It was _everything_ he needed. His muscles weren’t sore anymore but they sure were beat. He had meandered out after a while, putting on the yukata before going back to his room.  
  
Lyla had already returned, blow drying her hair and also wearing the yukata. He stared at her as she smiled at him, rosy from the warmth, her hair kind of curly. Woah there, buddy. Clearing his throat, he suggested they eat the snacks they bought and lie in bed. She…had been the one to say one large bed was fine.  
  
Shin rolled the bag up, standing to go wash his hands in the bathroom. “So Lai…let’s talk.”  
  
“Shin-n-n.”  
  
His eyes narrowed as he came back, settling in bed beside her again on his side. She tried to pout to get out of it probably but they’d skirted the issue enough. “Look, Lai, it’s _not_ a big deal, I just…wonder, is all.”  
  
She made a face, picking up the remote to turn off the television. “…I don’t want you to laugh at me. I don’t want you to feel sorry for me either.”  
  
Tilting his head, he murmured, “Never…what is it?”  
  
“…No one’s ever said they love me before.”  
  
…Shit. “Lai…”  
  
“So that was it, okay? I…I don’t know if you meant it but it was the first time so I got moved by the moment.”  
  
Glowering, he grasped her hand, “I wouldn’t just _say_ that, Lyla. I do love you. I…I get it now.”  
  
Lyla snorted, “Yea right. I guess you can ‘get it’ but you don’t know anything about what it’s like for me, Yagami Shin. I don’t know what ‘love’ is. I only returned the sentiment because I think you’re as close as I’ve gotten. I…I don’t know anything.”  
  
Shin frowned, deliberating, “…I…I guess how _do_ you feel about me, Lyla?”  
  
“How do you feel about _me_?” she countered dryly.  
  
Pursing his lips, he turned on his back and stared at the ceiling. “I feel like you’re my best friend who’s been with me a long time, Lai. We’ve been together since we were five, six years old, y’know? We’ve come through stages together and I want more than anything for you to be happy in this world. I was trying to run away when I found you but you…you made my insecurities at the time better. You’re…you’re very important to me.”  
  
“Baka” she mumbled, hugging her knees, “You’re gonna make me cry.”  
  
He chuckled, awkwardly stretching his arm to rub her back, “So now can _I_ get an answer?”  
  
As usual with Lyla, she hadn’t said anything for a while and he actually dozed off once in between. However, she murmured, “You’ve always been there for me. The day we met, I know you were off to do something more important but you stayed for me. Even when you overheard my father say that disgusting thing about you and your family, you didn’t turn me away. You made sure I got to go to my first concert and…you’ve always made sure your hand was there to hold. I’ve…I’ve never had that from anyone. I…I didn’t want it to sound like that, what I said. I know I love you.”  
  
She made him all nervous and shy with that. Pinking a bit, he nodded, “I-I understand.”  
  
“ _However_.”  
  
”Oh good, there’s a however” Shin groaned.  
  
Lyla intertwined her fingers, outstretching her arms. She pressed her lips together before drawling, “…I think it’s awkward. I feel like I could tell you everything but this so it must be.”  
  
Curious, Shin turned back on his side. “Tell me.”  
  
“…Remember we were talking that once about me sleeping over? You know, the ‘parts’ talk?”  
  
Racking his brain, he slightly recalled that. Oh. She said she trusted him above anyone else. “…Yea, I remember. What about it?”  
  
“It’s not ladylike, you see.”  
  
“Lyla, your school literally has ‘wifeliness’ in the title. Please don’t mention ladylike to me” Shin grunted.  
  
Lyla sighed airily, “The classes taught me it’s even more unladylike! The woman mustn’t have the same lascivious desires the man does.”  
  
“That’s bull—wait, what?”  
  
She gazed at him and he slowly did some…math? She was saying then they couldn’t sleep together now because they have…parts. And it wasn’t ‘ladylike’ to have ‘lascivious’ desires. Glancing off to the side, he ran the equation a few more times before…blanking. “…Lyla, what exactly are you getting at right now?”  
  
“I don’t know exactly. I guess I want what you taught me.”  
  
What he taught her?? He didn’t--  
  
While he didn’t mean to, he inhaled sharply, drawing back a bit. Lyla blushed and sighed, “I knew you wouldn’t take that well.”  
  
“Lyla— _Lyla_. I-hell, I don’t know what to _say_ to that” he blurted, sitting up.  
  
“Really?”  
  
Yea, unfortunately, he didn’t have a good response for his best friend wanting to have sex with him. He also wasn’t too positive about his response when she got up on her haunches, leaning in to give him a kiss. Oh boy.  
  
“Lai…” he shook his head, flustered.  
  
“Relax, Shin” she said faintly, kissing his lips again, “…The healthiest way to live is to make a way for yourself, right?”  
  
“I-I suppose.”  
  
“But sometimes you need a little help, right?”  
  
He stared into her eyes and wondered if this was deliberate because he was a hundred percent certain he was being seduced. “Y-Yea…?”  
  
“Then…won’t you show me how to make myself happy?”  
  
Shin could barely swallow as she looked at him hopefully. “W-What…? What does…what does that entail?”  
  
“Show me how to touch myself.”  
  
Yep, Koji put her up to this, there was literally no way. Rapidly looking around, he blurted, “T-That’s really funny, Lyla. You guys really got me this time.”  
  
Nope, she gave him the most sincerely petulant look. “I’m not joking, Shin! Show me. I…I got nervous when I tried and it didn’t feel like anything.”  
  
His face was literally _burning_ , he could feel it. “L-Lyla--”  
  
“I promise, I’m a quick study, Shin” Lyla said just a little _too_ eagerly, “Then maybe I won’t want anything like that from you.”  
  
Was this _actually_ serious? Was she literally wanting him to show her how to-to…? Running his hands down his face, he remembered to breathe and drawled, “O-oh, man.”  
  
“You’re not sexually attracted to me, Shin, so it shouldn’t be a big deal, right?”  
  
“Lyla, me-me showing or-or _handling_ anywhere in that dimension of your body is a little past our friendly zone. I mean, if-if I _had to,_ a matter of life or death or something, _yea_ , b-but there’s porn that can show you this! I can buy you porn!” he gasped, relieved at his epiphany.  
  
She frowned thoughtfully, “But I thought porn was unrealistic?”  
  
Oh, porn was super unrealistic, almost every woman there was faking, he sobbed into his hands again.  
  
…Okay. Okay! This…this was weird. Hella weird. And it’d probably be one-sided awkward since Lyla didn’t feel even slightly awkward asking so it was his responsibility to deal with the awkward. He took a long deep breath and mumbled, “L-Lie on your back.”  
  
“Okay. Should I get undressed?”  
  
His mind was in a far-off galaxy of oblivion. Staring at her, wondering if maybe he’d hoped _one_ of those ‘wifely’ doctrines was at least in play in their current situation, Shin smiled blankly. “S-Sure.”  
  
She so very casually undid the tie to her yukata, not shy in the least as the pale blue robe slid off her shoulders. He…really gave his damndest try to keep his eyes trained at her face but…okay, damn him, her breasts were nice. They’d always been really nice and he looked almost immediately.  
  
Shin gnawed the corner of his lip. Her nipples were really pert, just a faint pale pink color that blended into her creamy flawless skin, settled atop such round supple peaks of flesh…  
  
“Shin? What now?”  
  
He yelped, sitting up straighter as she lied on her back, pretty stiff. Right, right, no ogling, ‘best friend’, that was not what we were here for! He wanted to make her happy!  
  
“U-Um, so, first, l-let’s do a-a review of parts, ‘kay?” he rambled out, moving closer to her side.  
  
…Shit. “U-Um, o-open your legs.”  
  
He only watched as she did so so very…carelessly. Not a hint of apprehension. While he knew some people would wonder, he very much felt and realized this…casualness was because of who he was: the guy she’d been around her whole damn life. He wasn’t going to take advantage of her and he wasn’t someone she felt uncomfortable around. Just…damn, was he _that_ harmless she didn’t feel any sort of apprehension around?  
  
No, he…probably shouldn’t be, especially as his own…areas started to react, staring at her sex. She had pink ringlets of hair. It…had not even slightly crossed his mind it’d…match.  
  
“Shin?”  
  
“Oh, uh, yes. The…the thing is, it’s really simple, Lyla. Thousands of nerve endings are on this one part—really, its only purpose is for pleasure. That’s…that’s this part…” he trembled, feeling for the clitoris.  
  
“Right. I had kind of poked at it but I didn’t really get the point” she actually _shrugged_.  
  
“You…you don’t…poke it, per say, you…”  
  
Fuck. He squirmed as he ran his finger around the nub carefully, rubbing the upper length of his finger against the hood of flesh. Lyla bit her lip, gazing down, “…That feels a little better.”  
  
“Y-Yea…u-uh, when-when you start getting turned on, the…the lips, these…these pieces of skin will start to swell and…and it’s not as sensitive as the clitoris but…but I think some women like to…to rub here too.”  
  
He _prayed_ she didn’t notice him starting to get a hardon as he ran his thumb down her folds. She closed her eyes. “I…I think I like it…”  
  
“O-Oh. Good.”  
  
Shin inhaled shakily as she nibbled her lip, his fingertips still running down her lower lips, around her hardening clit. He groaned as she started to get a little wet. NOW she was alarmed! “Wh-What’s that??”  
  
“I-It’s natural. It’s…it’s lubrication your body makes when you’re-you’re turned on like this.”  
  
“I-It’s not--”  
  
“No, no, that’s…that’s a different part.”  
  
Against all his better…judgement, maybe? Because he wasn’t certain if this was good judgement given he was rubbing off his childhood best friend. Alas, he slipped further into nonsense and slipped his finger inside of her. She trembled as he stroked her flesh, whimpering, “T-That feels funny.”  
  
“O-Oh, yes. I can stop.”  
  
“N-No, I…I like it…”  
  
Shit. He breathed, pretty sure his dick was now visible under his robe. Abandon freakin’ ship, Shin! “T-That’s pretty much it though. You-you do that and you should…make yourself ‘happy’.”  
  
A trainwreck was far too strong a metaphor but he found he couldn’t really look away when she took over. He…might need to go slip in the shower again. “Y-Yea, so, um, I-I’ll, uh, l-leave you to that and, um, hang…out in the bathroom?”  
  
Lyla blinked at him a little absently before murmuring, “…Is that ‘morning wood’ this time?”  
  
“…No, not this time.”  
  
“…Can I touch it?”  
  
… “…If…if you want…”  
  
_What?_ No! Before he could renege, she’d actually sat up, eagerly undoing the ties to his yukata. Yep, this…had to be some alternate reality. He was still an alien that got back to the wrong place. Smiling because he wasn’t sure…what else to do with his face instead of gape in horror, he grasped her hands. “U-Um, on-on second thought, let’s-let’s keep working on you. I-I am pretty sure I know what to do with myself.”  
  
“Can I watch?”  
  
_“Lyla_.”  
  
Yea, she was definitely horny but probably didn’t even exactly know what that meant. He could only sort of groan when she opened his robe and his dick was at _full_ attention. “S-Seriously, Lyla. Ju-Just lay back down and try again.”  
  
He pursed his lips when she dropped onto her back with her legs facing him, starting to stroke herself again. Except it sort of seemed more like an invite this time? Absolutely not.  
  
“Shin, it felt better when you were doing it” she pouted.  
  
He closed his eyes, taking a deep breath. Okay. Okay, just…just this _one time_. “Lyla…this is between us and it can _not_ happen again, okay?”  
  
“Okay. What?”  
  
Exhaling, he gently stroked before folding back the flesh and thumbing the nub. She rasped as he fingered her again, running his fingertips across the inner skin. Lyla whimpered, her hips bucking off the bed. Yea, he…he was gonna make her come and that was it. Nothing more, nothing less.  
  
He gulped, staring at her soaking wet pussy with his fingers pumping inside. No, stop. Looking up, his lips parted at the way her breasts jumped when she moved, slowly reaching up to grasp a tit in his hand. She…she was pretty sexy right now though…  
  
_Stop it_. “Mmph, mmph, Shin” she gasped, her green eyes closing as her head fell back.  
  
Just managing to close his eyes as she shook and giving a bit of a confused cry, Shin mumbled, “T-That’s an orgasm. That’s…that’s where…where you want to get.”  
  
Lyla turned on her side, hugging her chest as she took soft breaths. Okay, good, tutorial over. Now they could forget about this and he would never inquire about anything ever again. Shin froze when her eyes slowly opened and she looked at him with this…just hopeful look. “It felt nice.”  
  
“Y-Yea? I’m glad” he smiled nervously.  
  
“Let me make you feel nice too.”  
  
“No, no, I-I don’t need to feel nice. I’m doing just great” he waved his hands, laughing.  
  
He yelped when she grabbed his shoulders and gave him a gentle push down. What?? Shin’s felt his eyes widen in… _shock_ as she leaned over and licked the head. _WHAT?  
  
_Honestly, he was more fascinated and confused as she kissed down the length before running her tongue around his balls. Wait a _damn minute_. “…I don’t think we discussed what you do to a _guy_ , Lyla.”  
  
She pulled away, wrapping her hand around his length and jerking him off. She blinked slowly, “What is a wife’s job, Shin? You know, per the people my dad has me learning from.”  
  
What? He bit his lip, covering his mouth as a light groan of pleasure came out. Fuck. “I…I don’t know.”  
  
“You don’t?”  
  
“It’s…it’s a title. It…it could mean l-lots of things…”  
  
“To you and your family, of course. To mine? It’s to submit.”  
  
Now he was getting angry again. “Lyla--”  
  


She pulled her hand away before pulling her hair back in a ponytail with the ribbon that had once wrapped one of their packages. Shin _processed_ what she was doing but he was pretty much frozen as she leaned over, “And a submissive wife needs to know how to please their husband, you know?”  
  
Shin breathed in when she sank her mouth over his cock, her tongue running down his shaft. “ _Fuck, fuck, fuck_ ” he whined.  
  
_No._ Stop _her_. Especially with that bull she just said! She was _not_ to submit to her ‘husband’ and give him head because she was to be a ‘submissive’ wife! Alas, his mind got lost in translation when she sucked his balls, jerking the length again. _No_!  
  
“L-Lyla, you-you listen to me” he wrestled out, sitting up as much as his body allowed which was not much at all, “Y-You— _fuck—_ no, no, you don’t—don’t give someone head just because they-they tell you to, you-your husband or otherwise. Y-You need to _want to_ too.”  
  
It was _almost_ a slurp as she pulled away, gazing up at him. Even staring into her eyes right now was sexy, what was _happening_? “Shin.”  
  
“Y-Yes?”  
  
“I want to give you ‘head’ or whatever you called it.”  
  
…Damn. He stared at her before sinking back, “….Okay.”  
  
And she just ever so casually continued and he covered his face. Never in his life did he imagine he would have to consider if he was going to have to see his cum all over his best friend’s face.  
  
Lyla started whimpering over his cock and he grimaced. What the hell is wrong with you? Now she was upset! He should have stopped her! Opening his eyes to insist she shouldn’t force herself, his mouth went dry. Her free hand was between her legs, touching herself again while she sucked his manhood…  
  
…All right, _fuck it._  
  
She squeaked when he pulled away, scrambling to open the nightstand. Lyla looked surprised as he managed to grab a handful of condoms and dropped them on the bed, ripping open the metal packaging and rolling it over his erection. “Lyla…please?”  
  
“I trust you, Shin.”  
  
It was about the most mindless thing he’d ever done in his life but he gently pushed inside of her, just…just an inch. She looked _very_ startled. “T-That’s bigger than-than a finger.”  
  
He chuckled despite himself, “Y-Yea. Please, tell me…tell me if it hurts too bad.”  
  
Slow and deliberate at first, when he heard no complaints and only her soft pants, he went…a little deeper, a little faster. She was…frowning though. Dang. About to stop, he was startled when she pushed him out…and pulled off the condom? “I don’t like this. Try again.”  
  
“Um, Lai…that’s to keep you from getting pregnant.”  
  
“Just jerk out.”  
  
“… _Pardon_?”  
  
Pouting, she spread her legs and grasped it, guiding it back inside of her. He groaned, biting his lower lip. Oh yea, that…that _did_ feel better but _no!_ “Lyla, we are…we are not…not doing this…without…”  
  
Ugh, she was _so wet_. Shin’s eyes rolled back as he pumped inside of her, the sound of squelching flesh and the feeling of his dick sliding in her silky pussy intoxicating. She was moaning, her voice deep and sultry, her arms hugging his neck. This…  
  
…Was _insane_. What the hell was he _doing_?! Lyla suddenly kissed him, startling him. “I-It feels so good, Shin. Don’t stop.”  
  
_Damn_. He nodded and kept going, his feelings mixed but also turned _all the way on_. She kept moaning his name, kept grabbing his ass to pull him in deeper, kissing his neck, and shook when she climaxed…  
  
Shin had _just_ enough reason left to rapidly pull out and come on her stomach, his heart racing. What in _the hell_ did he just do?  
  
It was as if nearly thirteen years of friendship did not matter. He had been a soldier for that line for so long and suddenly, she reached out and dragged him over it. This…this should not have happened.  
  
Feeling almost ill, Shin bowed his head and shook it. This…this was not going to be an awkwardness he could get over. He felt…disgusting.  
  
Suddenly, hands reached out and grasped his hand. He miserably looked to Lyla and found her looking pleased. _Why_? What made this _okay_ to her? “I…I just knew it would hurt, no matter what. That’s what they said, that you’re just supposed to take it to please the husband but…it didn’t at all with you, Shin. Thank you.”  
  
…Man. Hugging her shoulders to pull her to him, he kissed her temple. “…I’m glad I could be an example, Lai. I…I don’t want you thinking you’re supposed to be hurt.”  
  
…He probably was one of the only people she trusted, that’s why.  
  
Lyla got up, pulling him to take a quick rinse with her. After a pretty anticlimactic shower, he absently pulled on some basketball shorts and a shirt while she changed their blanket. Climbing into bed, he smirked some when she went out like a light, her mouth agape. He knew he wouldn’t be so lucky but…

He would never forget this night.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

 **End Notes:**  
  
All Star was this...hyper hit in the 90s by Smash Mouth. If that sentence means nothing to you, if you kids have seen Shrek, they were the ones singing "I'm A Believer".

Aden/Sonja are referring to Rune Factory Oceans/Tides of Destiny.  
  
The Tales of Genji is a classic Japanese story by Murasaki Shikibu.


	5. Proof

**Nomad,** Shin’s Story  
 **Chapter 5** : Proof

**Author’s Note** : Dang, I was sure I could queue chapters. Oh well. Next chapter. **Smutty Smut Smut**.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Yagami Shin realized around 4 this morning a train would be the most efficient way. He could put his bike in the storage car and they’d comfortably travel to Subami. So he got up, did the morning exercises he was now acclimated to, and went to the station to buy the tickets for noon. By the time he got back, Lyla was up and had ordered him breakfast…  
  
Honestly? On a scale of 1 to 10 on how uncomfortable it was, it…weirdly was only like a three. She was in the negatives and acting normal and he just strangely didn’t feel inclined to act abnormal. Maybe that was just because they weren’t like, talking about the fact they had sex last night.  
  
Shin groaned, now sitting on the train back home next to her. What on Earth had he been thinking? Maybe he was just really frustrated and hadn’t realized it. Still, he was no Koji or Nelly, it just…didn’t make sense to him.   
  
“Shin?”  
  
“Hmm?” he murmured, drowsy after no sleep last night.  
  
Lyla had pulled her hair back which, now that he thought about it, was very rare. She always wore her hair down…except now and last night when she…damn it! She pouted and turned in her seat, “I made you uncomfortable, didn’t I?”  
  
“…A little.”  
  
“I’m sorry. You’ve all always been very big on consent and taught me a great deal about it but…but I think I might have violated those principles when it came to you.”  
  


What now? He stared at her, puzzled, “…I mean, Lai, don’t get me wrong, I was…pumping the brakes in some places last night but the second the road was clear, I was going full throttle. I mean, I definitely consented…”  
  
“But consent is _wanting_ to and you didn’t want me.”  
  
…Oh. Shin was kind of at a loss. Yea, if he didn’t want her, that was either force or he was just kind of mindlessly going along for the ride. Just…no, that wasn’t it. He was definitely turned on by everything that happened so… “I…I dunno, Lai. Don’t worry about it.”  
  
“I don’t want you to hate me” she murmured.  
  
“Never that” he assured, rubbing his eyes, “Can I rest my head in your lap? I’m exhausted.”  
  
She nodded, covering him with a complimentary blanket and stroking his hair. It felt nice…before he dozed off, she murmured, “Shin?”  
  
“Hm?”  
  
“Can I ask for one more thing from you?”  
  
…Crap. “…Of course.”  
  
“When we get to the mansion, can you teach me to drive?”  
  
His eyes reopened as his brows creased. What? “…Oh yea, you…you wouldn’t have gotten to do that.”  
  
Lyla shook her head to the negative. He nodded, closing his eyes again. “You got it, Lai.”  
  
“Thank you, Shin.”  
  
He fell asleep for the hour ride, waking when the overhead announced that they were pulling into Hondo station. Opening his eyes, he found Lyla had also dozed back off, her hands rested on his locks. Shin gripped her fingertips, “Lai, we’re here.”  
  
She slowly woke up, drearily standing as he grabbed their bags and led her out to the station. Pushing his bike out onto the road, he took a breath. This…was home. He made a face when a bunch of people cut him off on the busy city roads. Yea, definitely home.  
  
Lyla held him tight as they rode up the streets toward the large mansions where they were raised. He smiled when he turned into the neighborhood and when he came to the iron gate of the Yagami estate. Finally…  
  
Going down the half mile driveway, Shin parked right next to his car, happy to see the vehicle in some odd way. Helping Lyla off, he sighed, “Mom had to run to work but she said she’ll be back around six. Dunno about dad and the twins are probably off up to Friday night foolishness. So, unless the kids are home, we have the place to ourselves…”  
  
And what the hell did that mean, Shin? Lyla giggled, holding his hand, “Let’s take a nap!”  
  
Shin snickered. _Maybe_ Koji wasn’t wrong…when she wasn’t shocking him, she was absolutely perfect. He reached into his pocket and took out his keys. Even the action felt kind of nostalgic. Opening the door, he gave a once over. Didn’t look like anyone was home. Lyla set her backpack down, excusing herself to the bathroom. He nodded, “I’m going to the living room.”  
  
He really just expected to stretch out on their awesome sofa with the elongated ends and take a nice snooze. Like, his mind was just settled on that. Instead, when he walked into the living room, he found his only baby sister trading spit with some kid.  
  
“… _EH EM?”  
  
_ Yagami Jill squealed, quickly jerking back and jumping to her feet. She looked mortified, “N-Nii-san!”  
  
Whom _ever_ this soon to be dead kid was looked petrified. “H-Hello, sir.”  
  
Oh, he was a ‘sir’ now, was he? Jill pulled the mystery boy to his feet and skirted around Shin, escorting him to the door. Oh _really_? Shin followed after them as Jill essentially told this _dead man_ to ‘run’. “ _Jill_.”  
  
“Nii-san! I-It’s not a big deal! I’m thirteen!” Jill protested, blocking the door like Shin hadn’t spent half a year running every day and couldn’t chase that kid to the _ends of the Earth_.

  
“What does that _even mean_?!” he demanded incredulously, “First off, NO ONE informed me that Yagami Koji is _obviously dead_!”  
  
“He’s preoccupied” she scoffed.  
  
Koji would stop _mid-sex_ if he had even an _idea_ Jill was kissing a guy, what in the _hell_ would have him ‘preoccupied’ enough to allow this to happen?! “Well, I guess we’ll _unoccupy_ him when he gets home.”  
  
“Nii-san!” Jill sobbed, grasping his coat, “Please, please, _please_ don’t tell Koji!”  
  
“What am I, a ghost? Does _my_ crazy not matter?” Shin huffed.  
  
Jill pouted petulantly, “ _Your_ crazy will never even _touch_ his!”  
  
While Shin wanted to challenge that, Koji was pretty damn crazy some times. Before Shin left, Koji ended up mangling some guy for making crude remarks about Jill. Like, literally doing enough damage the guy would need reconstructive surgery. It was warranted given Jill was twelve at the time and the asshole in question was eighteen but still. He seethed, dropping his head back, as Jill looked at him hopefully. _Fine_. “I will not tell Koji but you are _not_ to have anyone you’re making out with here without supervision. You understand me?”  
  
“Tony does it all the time!” she glowered, crossing her arms.  
  
“And I’ll tell Tony’s ass the same exact thing!”  
  
“Great!” Jill leered, “Now I’m a snitch!”  
  
He had five siblings. Shin tilted his head, honestly having a moment where it suddenly hit him he had _five_ of these. He had been in a form of battle his entire life. Squeezing the bridge of his nose, he shook his head. “ _Hi, Jill_. I missed you and it’s great to see you, imoto-chan.”  
  
Shin really did expect more sass but his little sister did gasp. “Oh my God, you’re right! Nii-san, you’re so tall and muscular!”  
  
Smirking as she hugged him, he sighed gravely and wrapped her in his arms. Damn, the hormones were here, weren’t they? Kissing her temple, he made a face, “And you’ve gotten tall too.”  
  
“Ha! Barely, not with you giants!” Jill gushed, “How was it? Did they tell you where you’re going?”  
  
“Not yet, it’ll probably be about five months before I hear where I’m heading and I’ll probably be shipped out in August” Shin explained.   
  
Jill clapped her hands, “So you’ll be here for everyone’s birthday!”  
  
Oh yea. “You’re right, I will be here for Shaun’s birthday.”  
  
The… _youngest_ was going to be thirteen. Jill looked up when the door opened. “Who the hell’s old motorbike is that?”  
  
Shin chuckled as the twins rather miraculously appeared. He did _not_ expect them to come home on a Friday. Alas, Koji and Nerimaru sauntered in, still wearing their school uniform, before cheering, “Ayyyyy!!”  
  
“What’s going on, troublemakers?” Shin smiled, giving them light embraces. He could sort of see what Jill meant now. While he went off and had a growth spurt in basic training, these two had shot up in general and were looking at him right in the face.  
  
“Nothing yet but the day is young” Nelly drawled, “Where’d you get that thing from? The Honda.”  
  
“Man, do you know how much that thing is _worth_ and I got it for two thousand pieces?”  
  
Koji’s brows furrowed, “And it runs?”  
  
“Sure does. Carried me and Lyla here” Shin nodded.  
  
This seemed to surprise them. “Nee-san’s here?” Jill questioned.  
  
With that remark, Lyla came down the stairs and squealed, “Ah! Koji! Nelly! Jill!”  
  
“Wow, this is a surprise. We tried to come visit you at school and it was like trying to get into a damn fortress” Koji sulked, giving her a hug. “Guess ol’ army dude knew how to crack the code.”  
  
Smirking widely, Shin remarked, “Lyla was left behind for the holidays so I wasn’t about to just leave her there.”  
  
Jill gasped, “You’re spending Christmas with us, Lyla?”  
  
She nodded, frowning, “Oh dear, I should get gifts for everyone. I never got to participate before so I want to do the whole deal now!”  
  
With a glance at his watch, Nelly sighed, “I do work for a couple hours at the mall, nee-san, if you want to ride with me and get some shopping done. If you finish before I get off, I’m sure one of the others will come get you.”  
  
What now? “You’re working?” Shin gaped.  
  
“Mm hmm. Working at the ol’ Foot Locker” Nelly yawned. “Koji and I decided to work part-time for some pocket change.”  
  
“I work at the coffee shop” Koji explained.  
  
“…Oh. Okay, that’s…rather responsible” Shin expressed. Felt like he was…entirely out of the loop on a lot of things now. “Well, maybe a trip to the mall is good then. I haven’t been in a while, obviously.”  
  
Lyla suddenly pouted at him, “Shin, I’m getting your gift, I don’t want you or Koji or Jill to see!”  
  
“Ehhh, you’ll have to hide mine somehow, nee-san, I’m meeting some friends at the mall anyway” Jill sighed.  
  
Shin gave her a look. ‘Friends’ _indeed._ But okay. “Fine. If you wrap up early, just go to Nelly and call me and I’ll come get you.”  
  
Lyla looked pleased and skipped to her bag while Nelly ran upstairs briefly, returning in a pair of jeans and a striped shirt. Jill grabbed her purse and gushed, “We’ll be back in time for dinner, nii-sans!”  
  
Nodding, Shin walked them to the door, watching them climb into Nelly’s car and take off. Okay, well, he guessed their…’nap’ was interrupted. ‘Nap’?  
  
“Now _whatever_ has the all saintly Yagami Shin been doing with his time, hmm?”  
  
Sometimes he expected to look toward his brother and find him with horns and a tail. Shin drably looked in Koji’s direction, finding he was lighting up as he leaned against the doorway. “You really haven’t quit yet, huh?”  
  
“Working on it. You quit thinking I was wrong about you and Lyla?” he grinned lazily.  
  
“…No?”  
  
“Oh, so you both just _mysteriously_ have hickeys today, huh?”  
  
What?! Going quickly to the mirror by the doorway, Shin looked on his neck. Not a _damn thing_. “You lying little--”  
  
“They’re under your ear, dumdum” Koji snickered, exhaling a fragrant billow of smoke outside.  
  
Shin turned his neck and almost died. Sure enough, there was a very small three or four kiss marks under his ear trailing to his collarbone. When did she even do that?! And when did he kiss _her_ to give her any?! Koji gave that Cheshire cat grin that tempted Shin to beat him up. “What happened? You two decide to make out?”  
  
“…No.”  
  
“So you were just necking it?”  
  
“ _No_.”  
  
Marching into the house, he groaned as Koji apparently put his cigarette out just to follow him. “Well, the damn things just didn’t sprout on your neck because you were thinking about it.”  
  
Finally sitting on the couch, exhaling because it was just as cozy as he was imagining, Shin grabbed a blanket and gave Koji a look as he sat on the other end. “…You tell anyone and I’ll end you.”  
  
“I can believe that now, Commander” Koji stuck out his tongue, “Promise. What happened?”  
  
Spreading the lovely throw his mother got in her travels over his legs, he smiled before glowering toward Koji. “…Lyla and I had sex last night.”  
  
“… _What_?”  
  
Shin shook his head, in disbelief he could now say that he had had intercourse with his best friend. This was…not great. Koji looked _flabbergasted._ “Dude… _what_?”  
  
“Needless to say, I was not quite expecting that. It just…got a little out of hand.”  
  
“A little ‘out of hand’?” Koji echoed incredulously, “You spent half a year fretting over her kissing you and within a day of seeing her again you banged her? I think that got a little _way out of hand_.”  
  
Flustering, Shin rubbed his temple, “…We were…talking about things. Where we were at, feeling wise. She told me some things about why when we were teenagers she stopped sleeping over and…told me what you’ve always told me. She has feelings above ‘platonic’ for me, I guess. I tried…to play it cool? But one thing kind of led to another and I…I guess I allowed it to get above platonic too.”  
  
Koji whistled, leaning back into the couch, “…What now? Like, you two didn’t seem…awkward?”  
  
“I know” Shin grimaced, “I mean, I…feel a _little_ awkward but she’s not bothered at all. I-I told her it can’t happen again.”  
  
“Well, I _naturally_ have to ask…how was it?”  
  
With a scoff, Shin threw a pillow at Koji, “I’m not telling you!”  
  
“Oh, come on” Koji heckled, moving the pillow, “This is the person you’ve known since you were freakin’ five years old, man. What were you thinking?”  
  
“That this is nuts and what am I doing! I was blown away!”

Koji nodded, raising a brow, “…But?”  
  
“…I mean, okay, it was…pretty nice. She…never mind! It was crazy!”  
  
Laughing, Koji stretched, “Well, want to knock out some shopping for Christmas?”  
  
Not particularly, that nap was calling his name but he guessed now was as good a time as ever. Standing up, he made a face as Koji started to go upstairs. Oh yea, wait. Shin followed, humming, “So, our imoto said you had some ‘occupations’ now. What has you occupied?”  
  
Koji rolled his eyes, going into his room but not closing the door so Shin followed. And, in doing so, he didn’t need Koji to say a single word because it almost was strong enough to hit him in the face. “ _What the HELL, Koji_.”  
  
“I’m surprised you know the scent, Saint Shin” Koji remarked sarcastically, going to his closet.  
  
Shin glared, “It’s not LEGAL, Koji. You get busted, you’re going to jail.”  
  
“Imagine taking something that fucking grows out of the ground and making it illegal to do anything with. Besides, _dad_ , our parents are aware and don’t say anything.”  
  
“Because they’ll let you get away with _murder_ , Koji” Shin threw his hands up.  
  
Koji snorted loudly as he came out wearing a black shirt and a pair of jeans, grabbing a leather jacket. Out of the promise or deal he made Sai, he put his part of the necklace he gave his childhood fiancée on. Well, at least he had SOMETHING innocent about him.   
  
“I’m just going to call it now, ‘nii-san’: when you’re not out being a soldier, your ass is gonna be a cop.”  
  
…Shin actually did feel his pulse speed up, very confused and surprised. “W-What? T-That’s…that’s not…true…”  
  
His slightly younger brother gave him a smirk as he picked up his black wallet, surveying the inside. “I know you, Yagami Shin.”  
  
…Damn. “Koji, I am dancing on _broken_ ice right now with dad. S-Seriously, I am not considering being a police officer too.”  
  
“What’s dad even gonna do, disown you?”  
  
“ _Yes_.”  
  
Just that dangerous insight of one Yagami Koji. Maybe it _was_ good he was on something to dull those senses because he was borderline psychic. However, after their discussion about how ‘poor’ he was going to be with his military career, Shin did have the thought he would like to continue to help protect people. He looked into the police program some in basic training but, well, let’s just say that was one other reason he hadn’t spoken to his dad in about two months: the man would _rightfully kill him_.  
  
Truthfully, even he knew he would be pushing it at that point. When he wasn’t off getting shot at by enemies overseas, he’d be at home…getting potentially shot at by people _here_. There was literally _no peace_ and his entire lifestyle would circle around the possibility of him dying, something Yagami Yamada had really, really wanted to protect him from. And add on the fate of his namesake? No, his dad might literally break his legs and stuff him in the basement if he came and said ‘oh, on top of the military, I’m going to be a cop!’.   
  
He was getting a headache. Walking with Koji, he grabbed his keys. “Let me drive, it’s been too long.”  
  
Koji made a face, probably because Shin wouldn’t let him smoke in his car but obliged. Shin breathed, just feeling a sudden…calm. He was home. Koji tuned the radio and stopped on the random American rock station as Shin cruised through the neighborhood toward the city.   
  
_“How long, how long will I slide? Separate my side. I don’t…I don’t believe it’s bad. Slittin’ my throat is all I ever…”_ Koji lightly sang.  
  
What now? Shin made a face, “What is this?”  
  
“Yeesh, bro, I forgot you were in prison for half a year. It’s the Red Hot Chili Pepper’s new album” Koji yawned.  
  
…Oh yea. His brows furrowed at the rather depressing song initially but it was kind of disturbingly catchy. _Slittin’ my throat is all I ever had…  
  
_ “I sent this CD to Lyla. Thought it was something you’d do” Koji stretched.  
  
“Thanks, man, I would’ve…”  
  
Shin frowned when…something pretty ‘screamy’ came on. What? “…What is this sound? It’s not post-grunge.”  
  
“Nu metal” Koji replied, “I like it. And, no offense, probably like it a little bit more than grunge. Don’t get me wrong: grunge took me there. Just not quite the way this stuff does.”  
  
Groaning at that next, Shin shook his head as he pulled into the parking lot of the giant mall nearby. “Don’t make me an old geezer just yet, Koji. I’m not even a year out of high school and I’m going to sound like some oldtimer yelling about ‘what’s this tomfoolery?’.”  
  
Koji laughed, “Come on, dude. I will _always_ love Soundgarden and Pearl Jam. Nirvana and Red Hot. But we’re too young to not be expanding just a little. Give Limp Bizkit a chance.”  
  
“Do you have _any_ idea what that is?”  
  
As his brother was cackling, Shin got the idea he knew _exactly_ what that was. Oh well, gross names aside, he guessed some of it was speaking to him in a vague way. Expanding, huh?  
  
Rubbing his face, Koji shook his head, “…Couldn’t tell you what to get mom this year. She’s on some kind of denim binge and it’s crazy.”  
  
Shin gasped, reaching into his pocket after he put the car in ‘park’. “Oh yea! Look at this. I want to get it appraised to see if it’s _really_ authentic. If it is, I have mom’s gift.”  
  
Handing Koji the antique Chanel bracelet, Shin was slightly amused as Koji seriously turned it over in his hands and touched the metal. Granted, _all_ of them, every Yagami child, knew how to identify a real metal or jewelry, he guessed it was just a very weird skill that they knew how to examine a bracelet’s authenticity. That was not _any_ of the son’s interest.  
  
Koji shook his head after a minute, bewildered. “…It certainly seems real. And the logo does not look replicated. The only thing throwing me is you bought this for _200 pieces_.”  
  
“Yea, and I bought that bike I rode for 2000 pieces” Shin snorted, opening the door.  
  
“Luck sure is smiling upon you, first son” Koji teased.  
  
Blah. Shin swallowed as they shuffled along with the large crowds going into the shopping mall, stuffing his hands in his pockets. “…Sure dad hasn’t said much about me, huh?”  
  
“I hate to say it, Shin, but you’ve definitely brought out a weird side of dad I didn’t think existed” Koji remarked, his brows tweaking, “Nah, he did not like mention of you in regard to where you were and what you were doing. He shut the topic right down. Anything else, he was gravy with like your car being maintained or moved around or keeping your insurance paid. The army and you? No.”  
  
Great. “…I don’t like that, Koji. You know what we’re coming out of. It’d be like if mom stopped talking to you” he muttered.  
  
“It’s coming” Koji shrugged.  
  
“I’m not joking, Koji.”  
  
“Me either. I’m going to break some chump’s face this year, man, and mom’s going to have my ass disowned because she can’t get me to stop” murmured Koji.  
  
Shin frowned at that before wincing. No… “I…I mean, I’m sure she’d be disappointed, Koji. But I doubt she’ll disown you.”  
  
No, especially given that they essentially forced a dark cloud into a bottle and gave it literally nowhere to go. If his parents _ever_ felt justified in doing anything particularly severe to Koji due to his anger, Shin would definitely remind them of that fact.   
  
“If that’s true, dad will get over it too. Just don’t be _too_ put off right now. However, for the holiday’s sake, might wait on that cop announcement.”  
  
Shin leered, “I _told_ you--”  
  
“You’re lying.”  
  
Rolling his eyes, Shin grunted, “Well, let’s leave every possibility of that notion behind until I’m ready to admit or commit to anything.”  
  
Koji nodded. “So how was bootcamp?”  
  
Tuh, that easy, huh? They meandered through stores, talking and occasionally finding things they thought would meet some people’s fancy. He found the perfect dress for the shoes he got Lyla. When they went to the video game store, Koji advised on what the kids were into nowadays _aside_ from making out. Pursing his lips as he looked at a perfume display, he glanced back to Koji, “We need to have an elder meeting when we get home.”  
  
“Shit, man, you just got home. What have you found we’ve done wrong already?” Koji scoffed.  
  
“Hmm, we’ll wait for Nelly’s presence.”  
  
“Great.”  
  
Shin looked around, noticing a fair amount of people in the area were speaking on a cell phone. Wow, weird. “I mean…is it a big deal to be able to communicate outside of the house?”  
  
Koji gave him a look, “Um, yea? Like right now, if Lyla had a cell, you could see if she was ready to go and go get her. Instead, she has to either pay for a payphone or ask someone to use their phone.”  
  
Huh. “I guess. What do you have?”  
  
Reaching into his pocket, Koji showed him a silver phone with ‘Uproar’ on it. Eh? “It’s pretty neat. I can listen to some music on it.”  
  
“… _What_? On your _phone_?”  
  
Nodding in confirmation, Shin didn’t know how to feel about that. “I don’t think I need anything _that_ advanced but I guess I should get one…”  
  
“You can get nee-san one too. They have prepaid plans where we can send her cards to refill her minutes.”  
  
Oh. Okay. They walked into the store and he listened to the various ‘perks’. “T9” text messaging, ‘splashproof’, ‘music’. He went with a Nokia 5210 for himself and a Nokia 8210 for Lyla. He smiled, picking out a flowery phone cover for her. He might give this to her early, he was kind of excited.   
  
Koji’s phone rang just as they left. Flipping it open, he drawled, “Hello…? …Oh, hey, nee-san.”  
  
Eh? Shin frowned as Koji listened to Lyla before nodding, “Okay, I’ll let him know. See you tonight.”  
  
Replacing his phone in his pocket, Koji continued toward the escalator, “Lyla said she ran into one of her high school friends here and that she was going to hang out with her for a little bit. She’ll try to be back by dinner.”  
  
Oh, that was nice. Pleased she was doing normal things, he tipped his head, “Cool. Wanna go grab something to eat then go harass Nelly?”  
  
“Ha, always.”  
  
…Yea. This…this felt like home.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_“This man did WHAT?”  
  
Shin groaned as he stretched out on the nook in his room, drinking a beer with the twins. HE was legal, these two had five more months. But at this point, that was just moot. Koji was dozing on the bed with his bottle rested in his hand and Nelly was sitting in one of the recliner type chairs Shin had. When they went to visit Nelly at his job, he got that giddy look and said they should drop off his car, come back, and they should go joyriding. Shin hadn’t been a fan of the idea but Koji drove Nelly’s car home and they swapped out for his. By the time they got back, Jill was, THANKFULLY, with her friends and also ready to go. While he hadn’t expected it, she pouted and said she ALSO wanted to go joyriding with her ‘big bubbies’. Fine.  
  
He had snickered at the time as Koji cruised down the highway, Nelly in the front seat while he occupied the back with Jill. For whatever reason, the twins were chanting along to ‘Born to Be Wild’. “Like a true nature’s child, we were born, born to be wild! We can climb so high! I never wanna die!”  
  
Yea, maybe THAT was their theme song. Jill had smirked, asking why they were listening to old stuff. “Hey, hey, classics are classics, young lady” Koji grunted.  
  
“What do you even listen to now?” Shin questioned Jill. He sort of stopped paying attention given it was…very pop-like last he did.  
  
“Well, to Koji’s chagrin, I do like Britney Spears…”  
  
Koji snorted. “Uh, whatever, she’s hot. Can’t stand her music but hot.”  
  
Shin smirked, “C’mon, Koji, give us a verse. Sing it with some enthusiasm.”  
  
“My lonelinessss is killin’ meeee. Gimmeee a signnnnn. Hit me, baby, one more time!”  
  
Nelly and Shin had laughed as Jill’s smirk widened, kicking the back of Koji’s seat. “You make me sick, nii-san.”  
  
Shin’s eyes widened as Nelly and Koji turned on something… “What’s Your Fantasy?” and then went verse for verse because why not? It was a lot more adult than Shin would figure Koji would let Jill listen to but he figured out that Jill was a teenager. There…really was no protecting her at this point, man.  
  
Thus, when they got back and dear baby sister offered to make dinner, Shin attempted to have the ‘elder meeting’ start off with that topic. Then good ol’ Koji threw out there ‘you know Shin and Lyla banged?’._

_  
“Dude, I thought you said Lyla and you weren’t like that” Nelly scowled.  
  
“I don’t know WHAT we are, Nerimaru. It’s beside the point as that is not why I called together the council” Shin snorted, looking toward them.  
  
Nelly smirked, “Only if you answer this: if she came in your room and wanted your dick tonight, you tapping?”  
  
Shin almost threw his beer bottle at Nelly while Koji grinned lazily, “Shin, consent is the name of the game but Lyla has always had you a little wrapped around her finger…”  
  
…Oh yea. He processed that and realized that, yes, Lyla would ask and he would oblige. That’s how it generally had always been and maybe a little of that was at play last night. Whining, he shook his head, “If…if she came in tonight, I…I need to turn her down until we discuss what is happening here.”  
  
“Uh huh…”  
  
“ANYWAY, so, it’s come to my attention that Tony is having girls over” Shin redirected.  
  
Nelly raised a brow, “…Yea, so? He’s a teenager now, it was bound to happen.”  
  
“Of course” Shin nodded, “But, then comes the problem of his twin sister, Jill. If we’re letting Tony entertain girls, are we letting her entertain boys?”  
  
“Of course not! Where the hell have you been?!” leered Nelly.  
  
Snorting, Shin swirled his bottle, “So, in other words, we’re going to be hypocrites with the only female in the sibling group?”  
  
It really looked like Koji had gone to sleep. He had gone to his bedroom for a few minutes so Shin imagined he’d taken his ‘medicine’. Prepared to just argue it out with Nelly to hopefully come to some not terribly hypocritical way of avoiding what he walked in on today, Koji drawled. “So…here’s the thing…”  
  
Shin looked to Koji who still hadn’t opened his eyes, “So, when I approach a woman, I am approaching them with my intentions. I don’t want anything, I think you’re attractive, if we’re both of the same idea, let’s get busy. Should at any point in this arrangement they want to bail, I understand and I respectfully duck out. Consent is the name of the game.”  
  
Shin slowly nodded his head, Koji drank before continuing, “So, if I were to hear that Tony was bullying women into having sex or being aggressive or rude, I would whoop his ass from here to Wednesday. However, I am aware how we all have collectively instructed him and Shaun in addition to our parents. I am confident he knows right from wrong. The problem with Jill is, I don’t trust not a fucking one of those dipshit boys have been taught the same way.”  
  
“Fair” Shin conceded.  
  
Nelly nodded as Koji sat up, stretching to his toes, “BUT, as Shin is suggesting, we start being hypocrites, she’s going to start sneaking around.”  
  
…Also true. Nelly glared, crossing his arms, “…So, we watch her closer or…?”  
  
“Our reputations precede us, correct?” Koji nodded, “If dude hears how we beat guys to a pulp and still wants to give a go at our sister, as long as I don’t see it, I won’t do anything. If I do? I’m going to ask him if he wants to have sex with my sister and if he says ‘no’, I’m going to whoop his ass because the bitch is lying.”  
  
Somehow, Shin just found himself staring at Koji in puzzled bewilderment. It…sounded like a logical plan as far as Koji plans went but at the same time, what? Nelly looked at Koji with probably the exact same expression before gesturing like he was counting, “…So, we’re not going to seek out the guys she’s into. She might even HAVE a guy—if we come across said guy, our tactic is not instant ass-kicking but to ask…if he wants to have sex with our only baby sister? And our permit to kill him or not is whether he says ‘yes or no’…and we want him to say YES?”  
  
“I don’t like it either, Nell, but what can we really do? We all can’t be everywhere. Shin’s gonna be in another country eventually, we’re going to be in college—Jill is a beautiful young woman. It drives me UP THE WALL but she’s probably going to want one of these no-shit boys around here. IF we come across him though? Yes, if he has the balls to admit to my face that he wants to get it on with my sister, then I MAY let his existence slide.”  
  
Shin rubbed his chin in thought as Nelly’s eyes narrowed at Koji. It…was the most unorthodox thing he thought KOJI would ever come up with. Alas, Shin sighed, “I mean, he’s right. Like…when I came home today, uh, Jill was by herself but she very well could have been with a boy.”  
  
“Yep” Koji sighed as well, “If she were, we just question his intentions and go from there.”  
  
…Kay. Nelly tapped his lip, muttering, “…I mean, I’m getting lost on this part where I ask this penised being if he wants to put his penis in my baby sister and I want him to say ‘yes’.”  
  
“THAT’S the next part” Koji droned, pressing his cell phone to his ear.  
  
What? After a moment, Koji replied, “Princess, step into the eldest’s wing for a momento, if you have it.”  
  
Uh oh. Shin sat up completely straight and Nelly gave Koji a very questioning look. Maybe two minutes later, Jill slowly entered the room. “Uh, you summoned?”  
  
Koji sat up, crossing his legs, and smiled, “We need to have a conversation, baby sister.”_

_  
Jill shot Shin a brief glare and he silently signaled ‘NOOOOOOO’ with as much nonsuspicious enthusiasm as he could. She looked confused but slowly nodded, sitting down, “Okay…”  
  
Rubbing his hands together, Koji looked at the ceiling before suddenly laughing airily, “…Wow, this was way easier with the other two numbskulls.”  
  
“Wha?”  
  
Oh no, were they doing this? Where was mom?? Shin felt ill before squeezing the bridge of his nose like when he found her making out with some boy all by herself today. FINE. “…Jill, um, so…we addressed it with Tony and Shaun, I…guess we can address it with you too.”  
  
“Absolutely not” Jill huffed, “You three are not having ‘the talk’ with me.”  
  
“Oh my God” Nelly choked, “Are we?!”  
  
“NO, YOU’RE NOT” Jill snapped.  
  
“A VERSION. We are having a version of ‘the talk’ because you’re going to have to understand things a little differently from your twin and other brothers, princess” Koji countered.  
  
Jill rapidly shook her head, burying her face in her hands. Koji folded his hands, “You meet a male. You like him. He says something stupid like ‘all girls should be on their hands and knees’. You…?”  
  
“…Tell him to bug off?” Jill glowered incredulously.  
  
“This guy says ‘do what I say?’ and grabs you…?”  
  
Jill scoffed, “I bust him in the nuts! Or you just end up teleporting there because your internal crazy sensor will be buzzing.”  
  
Hmm. Shin tilted his head, “Okay, so, guy DOESN’T say anything blatantly sexist and you’re in good standing with each other. You go back to his place at an OLDER AGE…he says he doesn’t wear protection?”  
  
“Wha? Why would he want a baby?” Jill demanded.  
  
Yea, Shin was pretty sure he saw Koji and Nelly’s brain explode, the twins almost falling over to their death. Shin was able to stabilize. “Jill, there are going to be men that will try to convince you to have sex without protection. There are going to be men who will wear the protection and remove it. You…must be mindful.”  
  
Jill looked perplexed, “…Why though?”  
  
“Because men SUCK, Jill. Stay away from them!” Koji barked.  
  
Shin smirked widely at Koji. Well, that was short lived. “Jill, a man can walk away all day from a baby. It would be YOU saddled with that responsibility. It’s not right and we’re not saying all dudes are going to pull that but, as Koji said, SOME men are not going to respect your boundaries.”  
  
“Yes, and we want you to understand your boundaries” Nelly grumbled, “No one—no man, no woman, NO ONE—is to force you to do anything you’re not comfortable with. We’ll protect you until the end of time but if you find yourself in a situation where someone is trying to hurt you, you call us or you call…the cops, I guess.”  
  
“Me first always” Koji said dryly.  
  
While she was frowning, she did nod. “…Okay.”  
  
“And it’s not just pregnancy either, Jill. You protect yourself against diseases too” Shin added.  
  
The blonde stippled her fingers, her brow raising, “So wait…are you really saying I can have a boyfriend and sex?”  
  
“No. You will never see a man naked in your entire life because I’ll kill every last one of them first” Koji smiled.  
  
Rolling her eyes, Jill sighed, “Then WHY have this conversation, nii-san?”  
  
“Because I’m only ONE MAN, Jill. I can’t get to every man efficiently” Koji rolled his eyes as well.  
  
Jill looked at Koji questioningly and Shin also was at a loss because there was no real…trace sarcasm or anything in his voice. Like, he sounded dead serious right now. “Um…anyway, Jill. The name of the game is…?”  
  
“Consent” Jill sighed.  
  
“Good. I’m done” Shin concluded.  
  
Nelly nodded in confirmation and Koji appeared dreary. “…I’d give my life for you, imoto, don’t you forget that.”  
  
“…I know, nii-san. Um, dinner will be ready soon.”  
  
Koji kissed her temple and nodded, advising they’d be down momentarily. Shin grimaced and looked away. Damn. “…I think we’re still hypocrites. I mean, I…literally just had sex with Lyla last night. That was me screwing with something I consider sacred. Our friendship means everything to me. And for us to tell Jill don’t dabble…?”  
  
“Our intention is never to hurt anyone. When we hook up, when we have relationships, our intention is never to leave that person in pain” Koji said softly, “…The problem is we can’t…speak for the other person.”  
  
…Yes.  
  
_XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
What a weird first day back.  
  
It was a little confusing that the two youngest sons were out until ten without question, arriving and excited to see him very briefly before going to play video games. Jerks.  
  
Around 11, alas, the door opened and the one and only Yagami ‘Yagada’ Dana walked through the door. Shin was about ready to head to bed but he had to admit, seeing her just kind of…brought back memories. He would wonder in his youth why he wouldn’t get to see her all the time. She would stop by and visit and play and talk with him but…there were days when he just looked for her to come through the door with the twins. She…  
  
He smiled as she squealed, “My Sweetie Plum!!”  
  
 _She_ wasn’t disappointed in him.  
  
Hugging her when she rushed him, kissing his cheeks, he squeezed her tight, “Mama, I was just about to go pass out. You still keeping those vampire hours?”  
  
Dana pouted, “I was here _all morning_ waiting for you and then someone called and said the store had a leak! I was doing inventory for the lost material all day.”  
  
Oh, jeez. “Oh mom, I’m sorry” he frowned, “I’ll come help you get that patched up tomorrow or do some errands.”  
  
“Oh, you don’t have to worry about that, honey. But look at you! You’re as tall as your papa now!”  
  
Ha, yea… “And so muscular! Were they feeding you?” she sulked.  
  
He snickered, “ _Yes_ , mom. And my sergeant was _very_ impressed when I advised them my mother is in fact not from a military family given both the tone and words you used with him.”  
  
Shin was mildly allergic to walnuts and, during bootcamp, without warning, was given a dish with walnuts and his face swelled up like a balloon. It was fine, an antihistamine later and he was peachy, just…they were going to _continue_ to serve him that same dish or, per the cooks, he could go hungry. He was so pissed and hungry. Unfortunately, that was the phone call nights and really all he’d been doing was _venting_ to his mother about it. Somehow he managed to forget exactly who his mother was and, by that next meal, he had a separate dish free of walnuts and the comment that ‘your mother would have made general by now with that fire’.  
  
She held his hands, smiling, “Well, I’m glad that part is over. Of course, I guess the next part is the worrisome part…”  
  
“A little” he murmured.  
  
“Well, your papa is in Sapporo” she explained, leading him back to the kitchen, “He was asked to come in and operate on this public official. He probably won’t be back until tomorrow morning.”  
  
Oh. “That’s fine. I, uh, I’m sure he’s in no rush to see me.”  
  
Dana scowled, “Don’t be silly, he’s very excited to see you home. He was going on about it all week.”  
  
Hmm. “You had Lyla with you, right?” Dana asked, turning on the kettle.  
  
Smirking, Shin directed the woman to sit, going to get the leftover stir-fry out of the fridge. “Oh yea.”  
  
Lyla got back at around 10 as well, all smiles, and he was pretty sure he might have kissed her if they were alone, she was so damn cute. Yea, they were in _serious_ need of discussion. The pink haired woman had gone upstairs a while ago, having eaten while she was out, but came down now, wearing a robe. Um. “Oh!! Hi, Dana!”  
  
“Hi, sweetie! You’re looking well!” Dana gushed, hugging her.  
  
Shin glanced back over his shoulder as he warmed his mother’s plate and made her tea, frowning. Well, it…it wasn’t like his parents didn’t already like her. Just…  
  
“I hope it’s not too much of a bother that I’m here, Dana” Lyla frowned, “I know that Christmas is a family affair for you all.”  
  
“Of course not” Dana huffed, “You are family too.”  
  
Oh jeez. Shin smiled awkwardly as he sat down across from his mom, Lyla standing, “Thank you for that, Dana, I…I always appreciate that. I’m going to go lay down, we had a long day.”  
  
“Okay, sweetie. Good night, I’ll see you in the morning” Dana smiled.  
  
Shin sipped the tea he made himself as his mother picked up her chopsticks, saying ‘itedakimasu’ and digging in. “Where are your brothers and sister?”  
  
“Well, Koji and Nelly took off into the night so God only knows. Jill is apparently upstairs speaking to her friends on…instant messenger or something? Tony and Shaun are playing Super…Smash or something? I dunno, I can’t keep up anymore.”  
  
Dana snickered, “Super Smash Bros. I only know because eventually I’m going to have to pry it out of their hands one day if their grades keep falling because of it.”  
  
“Well, big brother is here to get that rectified” Shin assured jokingly.  
  
“I do need to ask ‘big brother’ if I should keep a lock on his and Lyla’s door tonight?”  
  
…Eh? Shin’s eyes widened as he looked up at his mother, shocked. Her dark eyes were half-closed behind her teacup. “Now whatever got into you two, hmm?”  
  
…Dammit, the hickeys!! “U-Um, just…just confusing feelings and misplaced hormones, mama, promise. I-It wasn’t going on or anything while we were kids” Shin blurted.  
  
“Oh, I know that” she rolled her eyes around, “I very much love Lyla so I have no issues with it. Just, given her upbringing and family has some strong similarities to mine, please wrap up.”  
  
Oh God. Blushing completely, he nodded, “Y-Yes.”  
  
“And I do not mean that to say you are not my beloved Sweetie Plum. You got me out of that situation and life, just…it’s not a set of cards I’d try to play twice” she whispered.  
  
No, not at all. Shin wasn’t sure _what_ would happen if Lyla ended up pregnant with his baby but he certainly did not want to find out. And…what the hell?? “W-Well, it was just a onetime thing anyway, mom, I-I doubt it’ll occur again.”  
  
“Oh sweetie, I’m pretty sure that’s _exactly_ what I said with your dad and you see how that worked out” she snickered.  
  
Bleh. Yawning, she stood to rinse her place, “I am _thrilled_ to have all my babies back in the house one last time. I can’t believe those knuckleheads of mine are going to college.”  
  
“Me either” Shin groaned. Soon, they’d…all be leaving the nest.  
  
He snickered when she kissed his cheek again, “I’m going to bed and I am going to wake up and make my baby a nice breakfast tomorrow.”  
  
“Aww, mom, you don’t have to. I should be making you food…”  
  
Dana scoffed, walking with him to the steps as they turned the lights off, “Well, if you can _try_ to keep those two hellions out of trouble while you’re here, you’re doing me a favor. I swear, that Koji is up to _something_!”  
  
Yea…definitely something. He bid her ‘good night’ as he wandered to his wing of the house, unbuttoning his shirt. Opening the door to his room, he froze.  
  
Lyla was stretched out across his bed, wearing a pink lace negligee. “Hi. I had actually come downstairs to ask you to come to bed. This is supposed to be sexy.”  
  
… “I would…say so.”  
  
“But it was asked, how difficult is it to seduce a Yagami?” she frowned.  
  
“…Probably not as difficult as it should be, honestly.”  
  
Shin shut his door quickly as she sat up on her haunches, pouting, “I know I agreed last night it was just that once, Shin, but…”  
  
Wandering over, he sat beside her and rubbed his face. “…Lai, what…what is this? I mean, are we…friends with benefits? Are we trying to be?”  
  
“Explain what that is.”  
  
“…Well, we’re…just friends and we have sex sometimes? Thing is, we’re not together so I find a girlfriend, we end that agreement and vice versa.”  
  
Lyla looked thoughtful, “…Can we start there and see what happens?”  
  
“Lyla, I’m not sure I _want_ to be that with you. I…I’m not good at separating my feelings like that.”  
  
Nope, he knew he was screwed when she got up on her hands and knees, staring at him beseechingly in the eyes, her breasts just tantalizing him to suck one. He winced as she kissed his neck again, stammering, “L-Lai, please. I-I’m…”  
  
Wait, _did_ he get to suck her tits last night? DAMN IT, _stop_. Shin swallowed as she started to pull off his shirt, sitting in his lap. He rasped as she kissed down his throat, pushing him back. This… “L-Lyla, look, if-if we do this, we’re wearing a condom tonight, okay?”  
  
“I asked my friend tonight if there was another contraceptive and she helped me learn about sponges” Lyla nodded, “It feels weird but not as weird as that condom did.”  
  
……Oh. At a loss as she started to undo his pants, he glanced off momentarily.  
  
…Well, guessed it was about to become a weird night too.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
 _For years after that, he beat himself up. Not because of the act in itself. No, that, that he came to accept that he very much enjoyed. No, it wasn’t…anything to do with the sex.  
  
After she climaxed, after he climaxed, she fell asleep in his arms and he got to hold her. She felt nice and warm and he loved that sensation of the thick comforter wrapped around their naked bodies in the cold night. There’d been others but…Lyla always felt like home. Yes, his family did too. This actual structure felt like home. But Lyla? Like Koji had said since they were children, ‘they’ made a lot of sense. It was just…  
  
A lot of years…too many years…he became a nomad.  
  
_It was freezing. Absolutely _frigid_. However, Shin would not be losing his progress just by taking it easy. He got up around six in the morning, Lyla still fast asleep, and jogged through the neighborhood. Some of the older residents of the nearby estates were getting their paper and waved at him.   
  
In Wasaba, before they moved here, he had friends in the apartment. He would run up and down the hallway to certain kid’s homes to play. Given it was thirteen years ago, some of them were a blur but he still remembered Akiyama Joe. It was sparse over the years but he was one of the few people Shin could meet up with again and just continue to have a friendly rapport. Back then, the apartment was, well, a community. When he got here, it felt…like isolation.  
  
Of course, he thought as he stopped to help Yoruba-san get her dog, Skittles, from wrapped around the fence, this _had_ become his neighborhood. It wasn’t like Wasaba, no, but he could wander up to these people and have a congenial conversation. They gushed that he looked good and healthy and prayed for his safety. It…it all felt like home.  
  
Jogging back up the long Yagami driveway, he briefly paused when he saw his father getting out of his car. Yagami Yamada looked toward him and his brows instantly furrowed. Oh. Shin pushed himself the little ways to close the gap, or…try to. “Hey, dad.”  
  
“Hey…son…”  
  
…This didn’t feel like home though.  
  
Shin would have offered a hug right off but his dad was giving him a bewildered look. What? What could he possibly _still_ have to say? Shin made it. He was promoted and everything to the next class. He’d… _done it_. What was the problem?  
  
“…Sorry, I-I’m just a little surprised you got so tall.”  
  
Eh? Oh yea, right, he burst up to 6’1” in his absence. “Haha, yea, I didn’t even notice until Lyla said something.”  
  
Yamada gave him a hug, taking a deep breath. Okay… “Um, dad, I…I’m sorry I distanced myself after that last conversation, I--”  
  
“I understand, Shin” Yamada interrupted, releasing him and stuffing his hands in his pockets with a slight smile. “I’m…still working on it, son. I think my imagination is more vivid than I thought it was.”  
  
“Mm…”  
  
Patting his shoulder, Yamada smiled, “Let’s go get breakfast and you can tell me about your progress.”  
  
…Okay. So, maybe…maybe not so bad. Maybe…maybe this was okay. Maybe, just maybe, this…this was going to still be home.   
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  


 _…Or not_.  
  
 _Christmas was awesome. Nelly got him some Nikes, Koji got him a new CD player, and the kids gave him CDs. His parents got him some clothes and a new television. It was a splendid holiday. Lyla loved her outfit. She…she got him a small metal pendant to wear on his army dog-tags. It was inscribed with ‘peace’ on one side and ‘safety’ on the other. While it wasn’t army protocol, he promised he’d wear it…  
  
And then it came up. When they were eating a dinner of chicken yakitori, his father asked: “So Shin, what are you going to be doing when you’re not on duty?”  
  
Shin could have died. Luckily, Koji didn’t say a word but the idea was weighing heavily on his mind. Just not on CHRISTMAS. “Uh, not sure yet, dad. I really don’t want to be a liability to anyone when I am away on active duty so the army may have to be my career.”  
  
His dad gave him a look. Shin had never particularly tried to be untruthful with his father. However, ever since he was a kid, if he even attempted, his dad just knew. Yamada took a sip of wine before clearing his throat, “…Well, I imagine you can do temporary jobs in the meantime.”  
  
“Y-Yes.”  
  
For the rest of the night, his father fell quiet but everyone else spoke normally. Shin thought it was going to be okay…  
  
_But no, nothing was ‘okay’ now.   
  
Yagami Shin gritted his teeth as he stomped to his brother’s wing of the house, hearing the dull hum of music that was probably blasting within the four walls where it was homed. Coming to the door, he knocked hard. “KOJI.”  
  
 _Pick it, pack it, fire it up, come along, and take a hit from the bong.  
  
_ Shin stared for a moment before looking down, noting smoke was billowing thickly from underneath Koji’s door. Well…that was _another_ reason his idea wasn’t great: he’d mostly be busting _his own brother.  
  
Inhale…exhale…just got an ounce in the mail_.  
  
Opening the door because his brother would not hear him over this, Shin just automatically groaned when the weed smoke hit him in the face. “ _KOJI.”  
  
_ Koji was stretched out on his bean bag chair, smiling. Shin blinked languidly, guessing the only reason Nelly wasn’t present for this hotbox was the presence of Koji’s best friend, Ueda Kurou, also known as Corey. The fellow in question was ‘taking a hit from the bong’, coughing a bit. Nelly could never articulate why but he didn’t like Corey. Shin surmised it was because Koji was close to him alone. The other chucklehead in this trio, Motosuwa Keiba, both Nelly and Koji had known a long time. He was face down in the floor.  
  
“Hey bro, you here to bust us?” Koji teased.  
  
“You _told dad_ after I told you _not to_ ” Shin hissed.  
  
“I ain’t tell dad _shit_ ” Koji snorted, inhaling from a blunt, “…Wait, what did I tell dad?”  
  
Taking a deep breath…and getting dizzy, Shin grunted, “About the _cop thing_ , Koji.”  
  
Keiba lifted his head, his purple eyes bloodshot as he droned, “Cops?”  
  
His brother held up a hand, giving him a look, “Shin, you know damn well I did not tell dad about you thinking about joining the cops. I held down your army deal for almost _months,_ dumbass. I’m not announcing your life plans.”  
  
…Damn it. Shin shook his head, leaving the room, half because he was frustrated and half because he was starting to get dazed. He wasn’t surprised when Koji followed, closing the door behind him. His dark eyes were red as he leaned against the wall. “What happened?”

  
“Called and laid me the hell out about the army” Shin glared, “About me ‘throwing my life away’. Then he ended the conversation with ‘and don’t get any smart ideas about being a police officer either’.”  
  
Koji grimaced, groaning as he squeezed the bridge of his nose. “…Did you do a search on ‘police employment’ or something on the computer?”  
  
… “…Yea, a couple days ago. Why?”  
  
“Dad is working with the police program on some medical program…sometimes he uses the history to search his previous findings.”

  
Well, that was just _swell_. Shin gripped his head, whining, “I-I can’t be here when dad gets back. He’s gonna break my legs and lock me in the basement.”  
  
“Do what now?” Koji echoed, raising a brow, “Bro, granted, it’s not like _your_ relationship with him but dad’s been having random heart to hearts with me for a while now. I know it’ll be hard but if maybe you just sat down with him and hashed this out, you’ll feel better.”  
  
Ha, unlikely. “…I think I’m going to take off for a little bit. Maybe post up at a hostel for a little while and work construction until I get my papers.”  
  
While _most_ of the family would protest, Koji nodded, “Might be a good idea.”  
  
No, it wasn’t! Koji stood up straight, blinking knowingly, “It won’t fix where you’re at with dad though, Shin, recognize that.”  
  
“…That goes two ways though, Koji.”  
  
His brother frowned but nodded, “I agree. I also know a lot of Wasaba kids, Shin, and they tell me that they’re trying to avoid death. You’re running in multi-directions toward it. Dad’s far removed from Wasaba but that life was his foundation. He’s gonna need time to wrap his head around what it is you’re doing.”  
  
…Damn it.   
  
Koji went back to his room as Shin slipped down the stairs, at a loss. Yea, well, he couldn’t do anything for that. He…he couldn’t live an alternative life for his dad. It just…  
  
“Do you mean for the exact same thing that happened with you and your mother to happen with you and Shin, Yamada?”  
  
Freezing, Shin quickly slinked back on the steps. It…sounded like mom. Nothing returned with that comment, however. She grumbled, “Well?”  
  
“…My mother essentially disowned me, Dana. I was dead to her, remember?”  
  
Oh, so he was here. Shin crossed his arms, leaning back. He…probably shouldn’t listen in on this again. Just… “Over a decision you made, Yamada. Over deciding you were going to take care of me and your child. You’re being as irrational as she was right now.”  
  
“How _even_?”  
  
“Because your life was on the line when you decided to accept your responsibility too, Yamada! She didn’t even know the exact details but it was true! They could have _killed_ you, you have the scar to prove it!”  
  
…Eh? Shin’s brows furrowed as his dad just…sighed? What scar? “…I have been _shot_ at, grazed by bullets, beaten—yes, _carved into_ —for you and my son. And I’d do it _all over again_. But I’m sorry— _I’m sorry,_ I…I just didn’t…want that for them. I didn’t want that for our children, I didn’t want them to have to live my life, Dana.”  
  
…Damn it. “But we want them to live their life, right? Maybe…maybe I don’t want them to get hurt and it shakes me up inside too but…please, I…I trusted you with our firstborn and I know how much you love him…don’t…don’t let it go this way.”  
  
Trembling, Shin rubbed his arm and quickly snuck around the corner, grabbing the keys to his car.   
  
Okay, he got it. He understood. It…it wouldn’t fall into place until he could show his dad he could make it. Would make it. Right now, it…it was all up in the air. That was perhaps what his dad’s mom thought, it…it was all up in the air, what he could do. For now? He…he _did_ have to prove himself. Like Koji said, his dad’s foundation, his experiences, said what Shin was planning was a death sentence.  
  
He’d prove himself.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

**End Notes:**  
  
I don’t own Steppenwolf’s “Born to be Wild”, Britney Spears “…Baby One More Time”, or Ludacris’ “What’s Your Fantasy?”. _Can I rap it verse for verse though_? “We can do it in the pouring rain, under a train, when it’s hot or when its cold out~” (A.k.a. as a song I had no business singing at 11).  
  
So when Koji and his little group were ‘indulging’, they’re listening to Cypress Hill’s “Hits from the Bong”.  
  
A lot of allusions to Dirty again but they’ll work themselves out here.


	6. Omikuji

**Nomad,** Shin’s Story  
 **Chapter 6** : Omikuji

**Author’s Notes:** Oops, missed Wednesday and Saturday in some time zones! Anyway, I’ll try to stick to a Saturday update schedule. I’ve been really into just like…writing this. It gets NUTS.  
  
And please keep in mind that the entirety of the Legacy series is a whole alternate universe to even our own though it has many of the same components. I think of each nation as a melting pot so it’s not unusual to have hints of various cultures within each. And it’s just a little easier to make it a little more American. I research the culture and try to encompass it correctly but sometimes it makes me uneasy…so yea, sometimes its an unusual crossover. ESPECIALLY with the military aspect, Japan does not appear to have this sort of system at all but, well, again, for our purposes.

Dark themes and the SMUTTIEST of smuts. Enjoy!  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

“What? You slept in your car last night?”  
  
It was probably the worst night of sleep he’d ever gotten too. Shin rubbed his face, grimacing, his phone pressed to his ear. Koji called him while he was heading to school, apparently confused because while he and Nelly made it an extra point to go missing and not come home sometimes, Shin did not. Shin had parked off in the woods somewhere and listened to music until he TRIED to go to sleep but…this wasn’t going to work either.  
  
“Dude, I really don’t know what’s gotten into you. I never expected you to be so…avoidant.”  
  
Shin sleepily looked around at the gray winter sky, shivering a bit under his coat. “I’m the passive aggressive one, right? Isn’t this exactly something I’d do?”  
  
“I suppose…”  
  
No, Koji didn’t mean ‘avoidant’, he meant ‘irresponsible’. Here he was in a fairly new nice car sleeping in the woods by himself. “I’ll come home before I do this again but I hope I can find some work then get a place for a little bit. I…It was a different circumstance, our grandmother kicking dad out, but I think the space might be needed to prove myself.”  
  
Koji didn’t say anything for a moment before saying…briskly, “Remember what I told you, Shin. All this gloom and doom shit about you meeting your end doing whatever craziness you’re doing is irrelevant. You promised me.”  
  
“And this is real life, Koji. I can promise you with a thousand percent sincerity but I might get hit by a car and die. It’s not realistic for me to promise you anything.”  
  
“And I’m not talking about that sort of bullshit, Shin. Fate and all that shit, happenstance or whatever the fuck you want to call it. Dad’s putting you in the grave and you’re trying to prove to him you’re not gonna die. None of it’s ‘relevant’.”  
  
Squeezing the bridge of his nose, Shin shook his head. It seemed strangely naïve for Koji. Or it would if it didn’t sound like he’d sincerely come to the afterlife and beat him up if he died. “Okay, Koji.”  
  
“Don’t patronize me.”  
  
Shin leered, “Sorry, kind of hard NOT to sound patronizing when you’re making me promise not to get myself killed when I’m in a WAR, Koji. I’m pretty sure no one ever went over to fight and was planning on dying.”  
  
“Of course not. I just want you to think long and hard about it.”  
  
What now? “Koji, I am…not in a place for this conversation right now, I’m sorry.”  
  
“We’re Yagami” Koji said simply, “We end up in this circumstance where it looks like we’re at the end of the rope, where everything has been exhausted—and when it looks like everything is lost, done, finished, what do you do?”  
  
“…I dunno?”  
  
“And that’s the shit I’m talking about, dumbass.”  
  
Shin closed his eyes, dropping his head back against the rest. “…“Have you ever been close to tragedy or been close to folks who have? Have you ever felt a pain so powerful, so heavy you collapse? That kind of thing? Because, unfortunately, I would also have to answer ‘no’.”  
  
“Ha. Yea, I guess it is something like that. You knock on wood or whatever the hell it takes, Shin.”  
  
…Mm. “I understand” Shin murmured, “…I can’t bow or break to the circumstances. If…if I do fall, I promise that I’d have tried my hardest to keep my promise. Irrespective, I’m going to keep my distance for dad’s sake right now. I’m probably just pissing him off.”  
  
Koji groaned, “…Whatever. Why don’t you go see nee-san and work out some of these ‘frustrations’?”  
  
What? “And what sort of ‘working out my frustrations’ are you suggesting, Koji?” Shin glowered.   
  
“Uh, the fucking kind because any other, I’d kill your ass before you have to worry about any Sechians having the honor.”  
  
Rolling his eyes, Shin tapped the steering wheel. After their second rendezvous, he really pumped the brakes on that. It just…wasn’t normal enough for him. It was enjoyable, no doubt, but it…didn’t sit well on his conscience right now. At the time, though, he was glad she got caught up in the ‘holiday spirit’ so she wasn’t quite so…fixated on them sleeping together. She enjoyed herself and seemed depressed when he dropped her off a few days ago back to that stupid school.  
  
Mm. “…I guess I can possibly go check on her. We can spend the New Year together…PLATONICALLY.”  
  
“Or screw into a new millennium.”  
  
One track damn mind. Shin turned on his car and grimaced, feeling weird about not having brushed his teeth. No, the homeless car track was not for him. “…Had dad left by the time you left?”  
  
“Yea, the house is empty…you sure you want it to be like this, Shin?”  
  
…No. But…his choice apparently made him a stranger to the only home he’d known. Or, at least a part of it. It…would be a long road but he’d gain his place again.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
Yagami Shin meant to bathe and leave when he arrived at the Yagami Mansion. Alas, after a nice hot shower, brushing his teeth, and a warm bowl of miso while sitting on their couch, well, he woke up and it was about two in the afternoon. It left him a very small window of escape, enough time to get his thankfully prepacked bags and book it, but he guessed his body didn’t care anything about any of his conceived issues: this was home and the place let him sleep like a dream. No, he had been through boot camp, he was trying to prove himself to his father, but, should all of his plans to live outside of the house fail, he completely accepted he was too bougie to _not_ come home and live comfortably. Then.  
  
He took the hour and half drive to Lyla’s school in his car, figuring it was just way too cold to properly enjoy his motorcycle. When he pulled up, this time it was crawling with young women. Parking off to the side a bit, he used the arrow buttons to go to her contact and call. Hopefully she had her phone nearby…  
  
“Hello?”  
  
“U-Uh, hey, Lai. What are you up to?”  
  
“Hey! Not much, out of class and I was going to go to the store for a bit.”  
  
The store? He frowned, suddenly a little…confused. “Oh? Uh, well, I…I had come up to visit but if you’re busy--”  
  
“Really? Where are you?” she asked.  
  
Explaining his exact coordinates, hidden because he knew she was at school to learn to _not_ be ‘unseemly’, he smiled when she appeared, wearing a long red skirt and a pale cream blouse under a long black jacket. She climbed into the passenger seat, sinking down a bit and signaling for him to ‘go’. Sheesh.  
  
“You know, I never thought about, well…you _leaving_ the school” Shin droned when they were sufficiently far away enough for her to sit up and put on her seatbelt.  
  
Lyla nodded, taking off her gloves, “Some of the girls don’t even stay on campus, they leave and go back to their family’s estate. For those of us that do, we have free time until eight in the evening. We can go home on the weekends too.”  
  
Huh. “Well, that’s…not _so_ bad then.”  
  
She nodded before glancing behind her, her brows furrowing, “…Are you going somewhere?”  
  
Great. “Uh…sort of.”  
  
Giving him a questioning look, she shook her head, “Where?”  
  
“Um…not sure yet?” he laughed absently. “Let’s…discuss that over lunch? I’m starving.”  
  
Lyla gave him a leer but nodded, “There’s a nice noodle shop about fifteen minutes from here.”  
  
Thankful she just spent that time directing him to the place, Shin knew when they parked and were seated, it was game time. Sighing as they pulled into the parking lot, Shin smiled again when she grasped his elbow, hugging his arm. He…couldn’t help think about her in all his nonsense. If he started to live on his own, gas was going to be sparse and he couldn’t make these trips. That…was one thing to consider.  
  
They were seated by the window overlooking a small lake, the edges slightly frozen. Lyla resumed her questioning expression, stippling her fingers, “So, where to?”  
  
“Lai” he whined, running his fingers down his face, “…I’m _dishonoring my father_.”  
  
“Wha?” she scowled, shaking her head.  
  
“He’s…he’s pissed with me right now, Lai. I have made several decisions he is not exactly happy about and-and I know _why_ and I’m not able to sit around and disappoint him. The only way I can repair where we’re at is showing him I can do it, that I can help people like I want and come back not mangled or dead.”  
  
Lyla looked perplexed. The waiter came and took their order before she could respond. He decided on yakisoba while she got dumplings. Tapping her fingertips against the table, Lyla shook her head. “…In all the years I’ve known your papa, he’s…never seemed like the type of person you’d have to prove anything to.”  
  
Grimacing, Shin nodded slowly, “…He’s usually not but I’ve changed the standard. I’ve given him something that needs proving.”  
  
“But…I’ve always thought that you and Koji, Nelly, Jill, Tony, Shaun…I always thought you had the freedom to seek what you want to do.”  
  
Mm. “You told me yourself, Lyla, you said that nothing was off limits. I think my dad thought that…that it was.”  
  
She bit her lip, sighing, “…I do worry about what may happen to you when they send you wherever. I-I think that’s natural though, for anyone. But if you’re willing to put yourself on the line to do a good thing, don’t I have to support you?”  
  
“That’s a nice thought, Lai” he smiled grimly, “But, no, you don’t _have_ to, really.”  
  
Rubbing his hand, she gazed at him with her earthy eyes. “…I know. But I do believe in you.”  
  
Shin’s heart skipped a bit, flustering, as she played with his fingers, “…I just never really thought Yamada-san wouldn’t though.”  
  
“…I don’t think I’ve ever told you this, but…but y’know, when I was born? My…my mom, she was taken away immediately. Like, she gave birth to me and…and she was forced back to her family home. I was left in the sole care of my dad, he…he raised me from the very beginning by himself. He…he was really just a kid himself, honestly, like…nineteen and having this newborn while he’s trying to work and go to school. I think people often say ‘he didn’t have a choice’ but…but no, my dad did and he chose the absolute hardest one.”  
  
Wincing, he gazed down and took a deep breath. That was the other part, he just…he just really, really could not stand to hear and see his father’s disappointment. Not after all that. Lyla tilted her head, murmuring, “…You worry about what your papa thinks.”  
  
“…Yes. And-and we argued while I was at boot camp like we had when I announced it and—and he called and kind of laid me out last night about it and another decision I’m considering. But…have you ever been to Wasaba?”  
  
She shook her head to the negative. He didn’t go often though it was a standard hangout for the twins, probably where Koji was fetching his ‘fix’, but it was his home once upon a time. It…wasn’t great though. “Wasaba…it’s a bad area. Like, a lot of crime, a lot of robbery, a lot of prostitution—highest area of killing on the island, really. That’s…that’s where my dad is from. And…and his best friend growing up, where I got my name, he…he got shot like twelve times and my dad watched him die. It’s…it’s all a deep memory for him. He made it his mission to get us out of there because honestly? We could have just been shot as bystanders in that place. So, imagine, he…he made sure I wasn’t some hapless murder victim…and I just volunteered to be a possible hapless casualty. We’re…we’re just at a weird place right now.”  
  
“…So you’re leaving” she whispered.  
  
Shin gasped, startled, “N-Not _far_! Like, it’ll be in the more industrial parts of the city where I can afford to live but I’ll still be able to drive and see you, just like this. I’ll even try to keep my work hours when you’re in school. I-I need to still _see_ my family. And-and I need to still see you…”  
  
Lyla looked relieved, resting her cheek against his palm, “…I’m glad. I’m selfish.”  
  
“Not at all” he assured.  
  
“…I don’t think your papa will stay like this, Shin. I think he loves all of you so much, the idea of losing any of you probably bothers him—especially after almost losing your mama and watching his best friend die. But I doubt he wants you to lose your endeavors because of his understandable fears.”  
  
…Yes. “You’re right…”  
  
They chatted about other things as they ate, thankfully. It took his mind off all this mayhem going on and made some of it feel better. Sighing, she opened her purse, “You need to get back so you can find somewhere to stay…and if you _can’t_ , Yagami Shin, I want you to go home.”  
  
“I will, Lyla” he sighed gravely. Good thing he didn’t mention his little stunt last night, she’d have a fit.  
  
He scowled as she paid for him too before giving him a stern look. “You need to pay for a place to stay.”  
  
“Meh.”  
  
…Feeling awkward all the same, he drove her back toward her school and parked in the same spot. It…it wasn’t like they weren’t best friends, stupid, why were you going to make this weird? You could ask her anywhere. Just…what are your intentions?  
  
…Okay. “U-Um, Lai?”  
  
“Yes, Shin?”  
  
“U-Uh, New…New Years Eve to Day, um, I-I was wondering if you wanted to go to the New Years Festival with me? I-I mean, if…if you want.”  
  
She smiled warmly, “Of course, Shin. I can stay out too since the school will be closing again.”  
  
“Oh, uh, great” he rasped, “I-I look forward to it.”  
  
Nodding, she grasped his hand, “I’ll see you in a few days. And call me as soon as you find a place to stay tonight, please.”  
  
“I will” he assured.  
  
In the weirdest consensual moment for them, she kissed him and he kissed back at ease. She skipped out of the car as he sat there, dumbfounded. So kissing as parting and feeling weird asking her to go places with him now because it seemed like a date…?  
  
He jumped, yelping, when his phone rang. Eh? Looking at the number, he made a face when he saw Koji’s name pop up. After their last conversation, he wasn’t sure he was in the mood. Still, could be an emergency…clicking ‘send’, he pressed the phone to his ear. “Hello?”  
  
“Yo, I gotta be quick, I’m at work. Yaya came in for a cup of coffee and she wanted to see if you were available to come have a drink with her.”  
  
Eh? “O-Oh. Oh, okay, yea. Tell her I’ll be there in a bit, I was visiting with Lyla.”  
  
“Mm hmm, ‘visiting’” Koji snorted, “I’ll let her know.”  
  
Shin leered, wishing his ‘little brother’ could see it as he clicked off. Pulling away, he started driving back toward Subami. Man, he…he completely forgot to tell Yaya _any_ of his plans. She probably would be as pissed as his dad was.  
  
Hamasaki Ayame, also known as ‘Yaya’, was his basically nanny back when they were in Wasaba. While his dad did _a lot,_ it would have been _impossible_ for him to do it entirely alone. So, while the man was at school or working, Yaya watched him. At one point, she actually lived with them too when his dad started his residency. He couldn’t recall _exactly_ when or why, but at some point his dad started to get antsy around her and after they made the move to Subami, Shin rarely saw her. Seeing how his dad was acting now, it could be pure foolishness. Of course, it also could be that seeing his dad working toward being a doctor inspired her to be a doctor too and she was slammed with school. Still though…  
  
Koji’s place of work was a small little café like coffee shop settled near a ritzy area. Yagada wasn’t too far away, actually, amidst these stone buildings. Pulling into the parking lot of the coffee shop, he entered the tiny establishment. Koji was behind the counter, wearing a black apron over a black button down shirt with gray slacks, messing with a machine before he looked up absently. “Hey. She’s seated near the back window. Want to put an order in?”  
  
“Oh, uh…I guess just a black coffee with cream?” Shin didn’t know what to do with these fancy options.  
  
Koji smirked, “I’ll fix you something, geezer.”  
  
Shin stuck out his tongue and meandered through the crowd. There were a lot of couples cozied up, drinking frappy beverages, and people on laptops and reading books. It was a very…calm place to be, he really was not expecting Koji to choose something like this.   
  
He smiled at the woman all the way at the back window, sitting in a booth with her mug in her hands pressed against her lips. She kept her black hair shoulder length now, wearing a pale lavender blouse with a mauve skirt. He always thought Yaya was pretty, really. Strange she never married, she always used to talk about the prospect... “Yaya.”  
  
She looked up and smiled…some. “…You know, I still expect to see a little boy when I meet you. I can’t believe my baby is a grown man now.”  
  
Pouting at that while she stood to hug him, she gasped, “And you’re so tall! I guess I should have suspected that with Yamada.”  
  
“Ha, yea, I am pretty much his exact height now. He was surprised too…” he sighed, sitting across from her as she settled back down.  
  
“How is he with this army business?”  
  
“…Uh, not…great?”  
  
Ayame nodded, crossing her hands, “I can imagine. He names you after my crazy brother and he’s probably thinking history is about to repeat itself.”  
  
Hamasaki Shin…his dad’s best friend and also the same guy that got gunned down and died right in front of his dad. Making a face, Shin leaned back against the leather seat and drawled, “…No offense, Yaya, I love you, but I’m not taking on that sort of namesake.”  
  
“Tuh, _please don’t_ ” Ayame scoffed, stirring her spoon, “…My brother made such poor decisions, it’s hard to see the connection. I understand what you’re doing, I had _no idea_ what was going on with him.”  
  
“If you understand, can you please explain it to my dad?” he mumbled.  
  
“Shin, your dad has PTSD from living in Wasaba. I will be honest with you: I don’t. Yea, I may throw a punch or two or jump when I hear something that sounds like a gunshot but your daddy, he’s…he’s seen some things, Shin. Things you might end up seeing too.”  
  
Shin had raised a brow. “…PTSD? What’s that?”  
  
“Oh, sweetie” Ayame groaned.  
  
“I got out of the doctoring track, Yaya.”  
  
“And they should have addressed it in the military track” she glowered, looking pointedly at him. “Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. When you experience something traumatizing or disturbing, the event might keep chasing you in your mind.”  
  
Shin frowned, slowly shaking his head, “…Everyone gets a little traumatized by something though, right?”  
  
“Yes…but some people can’t let it go, especially if you don’t seek treatment. And Yamada did not seek treatment, Shin.”  
  
“…He probably just thought he’d get over it.”  
  
“I doubt it.”  
  
…What? Shin’s brow furrowed, confused. Why would he _not_ want to get over trauma? Was his dad some kind of masochist? Ayame sighed, shrugging, “But your dad’s an enigma, Shin. I know he has it but the man functions like a well-oiled machine. You wouldn’t even know he’d been through half the stuff he’s been through.”  
  
“Then how would you know?” Shin questioned, feeling a little…challenging. Granted, they weren’t at a great place together right now but it sounded like she was questioning his dad’s sanity and he wasn’t certain he felt too good about that.  
  
Ayame suddenly smiled. Shin glanced up as Koji appeared with two cups of coffee, setting one in front of Shin and one in front of her, “Another cinnamon latte for you, Yaya. You get a vanilla latte, dork.”  
  
“Thanks” Shin snorted, “I’ll complain if it’s too froufrou though.”  
  
“You do that” Koji snorted back.  
  
Ayame snickered as they swatted at each other, “Stop that. Thank you, Koji.”  
  
He winked and nodded, taking her empty cup as he left. Shin lifted his beverage to try, figuring he’d choke it down either way…eh, it was okay. Still a little sweeter than what he was used to but it’d fair. Ayame turned her red cup in her hand, drawling, “Don’t tell them, your siblings. Don’t tell your dad I told you either.”  
  
What? “…Okay.”  
  
“So, my brother you’re named after, Shin? He…dealt cocaine.”  
  
…Oh. “…Yea, I…heard about some of that _…_ ”  
  
“You see, it’s…complicated? I didn’t know him that well, Shin and my father, but he ran this casino or bar or something and it was frequented by the yakuza. Well, our dad was killed in the crossfire of some argument or that’s what they wanted us to think. I think he was meant to be shot.”  
  
…Oh. Shin only nodded, not sure what to say to this very dramatic occurrence. Ayame continued, “Your papa and my brother were…I think 10 or 11 at the time and they both worked there. When our father got shot, Shin ran after the guys that did it and Yamada stayed behind with my dad. He…he made your dad promise to look after Shin because, essentially, father knew early Shin didn’t have a good head on his shoulders.”  
  
Shin frowned, nodding slowly as Ayame glanced out the window. “…He left when he was about thirteen. I think I was like, six or seven at the time? He moved to West Wasaba which is a _terrible_ part of town but I think he did it to be closer to Yamada. They…they were really close for a time there. Of course, I think he also did it because that’s where his clients were.”  
  
Ayame sighed, shrugging her shoulders, “…I don’t have every piece but your dad met your mom at some point when he was seventeen. His…goals started shifting and he started to consider another lifestyle for himself. Shin wasn’t…with that, per se. He felt he was doing great as the slum cocaine dealer working for the yakuza.”  
  
And…he was named after this guy _why_? “…Okay.”  
  
“Yamada didn’t give me all the details but the guy Shin was working with, he pulled him aside and advised to Yamada that Shin was stealing money from his drug sales. The guy said if Yamada didn’t pay the difference, he’d kill Shin.”  
  
 _Wait a minute_. “Yaya…” Shin drawled, holding up his hands, “Why are you making it sound like my dad was involved in…this sort of sales?”  
  
“He wasn’t _technically._ Your dad worked legal jobs—the one with the Bryant family. He used that money to fill in the gaps.”  
  
The gaps for _selling cocaine_!! Shin groaned loudly, dragging his hands down his face. Welp, no, he guessed he _shouldn’t_ be a cop between his brother smoking pot and his dad being an accessory to drug dealing as a teenager! “Look, your dad was doing this to help a friend, no more, no less. The problem became when Shin got addicted to the stuff and Yamada had to start paying more and more. He…he had to stop because…because he had to take care of you and your mama.”  
  
Shin recoiled a bit, startled. Wait, _he_ got his dad to stop doing this craziness? Ayame stared at him almost…sadly, “…He told my brother to do it on his own, to get out of it, to…to do better. But…Shin had been doing it the crooked way for so long, he thought he could continue to get away with it. Then, one day, he…he and the guy he was working for, their head came to supervise. When Shin tried to explain the situation of why he didn’t have either all the cocaine or all the money, they…didn’t accept his reasoning. He bolted.”  
  
Oh yea, that…did not end well, probably. “Back then, these…groups, there’d be dozens of people in these rooms, buying and taking the drugs. Other dealers too. So, when…when Shin ran, these heads shot…and killed everyone in the room. The boss, the addicts, the dealers—when they ran after Shin, they killed people that just lived in the apartment.”  
  
…Shit. “They…picked Shin up off the street. Uh, they…they took him near the old apartment you were raised in and he pleaded for his life. They…they shot him to death right there. Your dad came out and…and he assumed it was the boss that did it, that had Shin killed for not having all the money, so…he ran…into the carnage. He saw…almost a hundred people shot up and dead on the street. I doubt it was the first dead body he’d ever seen, just…the amount of death…”  
  
…His dad had seen a different kind of battlefield.  
  
Shin pursed his lips, staring down into the tan drink before shaking his head, “…And, knowing my dad, he probably felt powerless in helping all those people.”  
  
Ayame nodded in confirmation. Damn. “…I understand completely, Yaya. Just…it’s the same for me, I…I can’t just see all these people getting killed for no reason and not be able to do anything about it. I just can’t.”  
  
“I know, honey. You’re your father’s son even if you can’t see eye to eye.”  
  
Shin smiled wistfully as Ayame yawned, “Well, despite all the coffee Koji has kindly provided me with, I do need to get some sleep before my next shift. Do you have a number?”  
  
“Ah, yea…”  
  
Giving it to her, she entered hers as well…along with another. “Do you remember Akiyama Jyou?”  
  
“Oh yea, Joe! I was just thinking about him, actually” Shin nodded.  
  
“Must be a psychic link” she teased, “I added his number too, he was saying if I run into you to give you his number and to tell you to give him a call.”  
  
“I will do just that. Thank you, Yaya.”  
  
“Sure thing, hon…and I’ll see you soon, okay? Think about me before you get shipped out, all right?” she whispered.  
  
Nodding firmly, he stood and gave her another hug. Honestly, he…only had one mama but he’d be lying to himself if she wasn’t a very, very close second.   
  
Shin sat at the counter on a stool after walking Ayame to her car, bringing his coffee with him. Koji was wiping the kitchen down diligently, not looking up but drawling, “What’s the plan, Stan?”  
  
“Yaya gave me Akiyama Joe’s number. I’m going to call him and if he lets me crash there tonight, I’ll figure out the rest tomorrow” Shin replied.  
  
Koji laughed. “Dude. You got dad pissed about the army, about the cops…now your ass is gonna go stay in Wasaba? He _will_ break your legs and bury you in the basement.”  
  
Sulking, Shin leered, “Well, he won’t _know_ if someone doesn’t tell him, correct?”  
  
“Dad hates it there, buddy, but you forget he’s still got connects.”  
  
…Oh yea, dammit. “Well, guess this will be first attempt at stealth then.”  
  
…Mm. “Koji, let’s play hypothetical situation.”  
  
His younger brother raised a brow at him before nodding. “So, you have a criminal that has a friend. This criminal gets picked up and dragged somewhere to be killed by people unaware of this friend’s location. Chances of this killer dragging the criminal exactly in front of that friend’s house?”  
  
“Without the criminal advising where this friend’s house is? None unless the friend’s house is some hotspot or something.”  
  
“…Why would the criminal tell where this friend lives?”  
  
Koji made a face, “This is way too specific for hypothetical, man. I dunno? I would think the friend must know something or has something that the killer needs to know about.”  
  
Shin folded his fingers, tapping his hands against his lips. If…the pieces were fitting like he thought they were, he…had literally _no idea_ why he was named Shin. He would be named after a fucking monster. “…Oh well, Yaya was just telling me a weird story. I thought some of it was missing a few pieces.”  
  
“Oh yea, I hate those types of stories” Koji droned.  
  
Seriously. Looking at Koji as he hummed, putting cups in a cabinet, Shin’s stomach turned as the implication further sank in. No, like… _seriously_. A…A fucking _monster_ …  
  
“U-Uh, I asked Lyla to come spend New Years Eve with me at the New Years Festival. I know it must be lame to you but you coming?” Shin blurted, needing to change the subject.  
  
“I’m coming for a little while but Keiba is throwing a party and I promised I’d come. But Jill wanted to go to the festival so of course I’m going to escort her and the knuckleheads.”  
  
Shin nodded slowly, standing, “Well, if Joe tells me to screw myself, I’ll see you tomorrow at home. I am…not a fan of freezing to death in a car.”  
  
“That would be ‘common sense’ when you don’t have to, dummy” Koji snickered, gripping his hand, “Call me regardless and let me know where you’re at.”  
  
“Oh, because you do?” Shin smirked.  
  
“Hey, I am either at a friend or between some hot lady’s legs, there’s no questioning my location” Koji joked.  
  
Sad. Shin smirked more and waved over his shoulder, “Don’t knock anybody up, Koji.”  
  
“Never!”  
  
Ha, yea right. Shin settled into his car, about to call his oldest friend aside from Lyla. He stared at the little gray screen before glancing up. He could sort of still see Koji moving around, briefly laughing at something someone said.  
  
…Being that they were children, only some things were evident about the way it used to be. His mother was snatched away the day he was born and only allowed infrequent visits because she’d been forced to marry someone else. Kamaishi. The Kamaishi were a huge pharmaceutical family or…so they said. So…they said.  
  
If…Hamasaki Shin told those yakuza he was working for where Yamada was? They…they _could_ have been looking for his dad but something tells him this story would be a little different if they were. No, they…they were probably looking…for his mom that was also in the apartment. Hamasaki Shin sold his mom out for his life.  
  
Squeezing the bridge of his nose, Shin shook his head, weakly gazing back into the small little café where Koji was now cleaning a table. PTSD…  
  
…Looked like his namesake caused a lot of that.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
“Man, you did WHAT?”  
  
Yagami Shin leered some as he sat in the apartment that was just pure nostalgia. It was the exact same apartment building where he was born and raised for a period of time. Not the same number, no, but just a floor above it. It was…way nicer now, they were almost a luxury in comparison. Really, this felt way more like the neighboring city than Wasaba. Akiyama Joe teased him and said not to ‘get it twisted’. “We’re still in Wasaba, bro.”  
  
Akiyama Joe was going through his refrigerator, humming, before standing all the way up. Joe was strangely tall, about 6’2” which was bewildering to Shin, being he was almost the tallest one in any given crowd now along with his dad and brothers. When Shin asked about Joe’s dad, he joked that all he knew was his dad was some ‘British wank that had some nut to bury and run’. Okay.  
  
Shin accepted the beer Joe handed him before plopping down on the sofa, twisting the top off like a master. “Well, I heard someone else’s crazy ass joined the army, thought it sounded interesting and I did the same.”  
  
“You are a damn LIAR” Shin declared, popping the top off of his and drinking the foam quickly.  
  
“Nope! Leave in two weeks! Got my gear and everything.”  
  
Shin glanced over near the door and shook his head. He wasn’t sure if he was surprised or not to see the familiar green duffel bag. “Joe, the army isn’t some flighty joke thing, man. You just don’t join because you heard somebody else did, dummy.”  
  
“I’m kind of pulling your leg, man. I got some old warrants for petty theft and stuff. Ol’ Bacchus heard about it from your dad’s ol’ gang that you had joined the military and suggested it so I can get that stuff cleared off my record” Joe shrugged.  
  
Yeesh. The redhead scratched his chin, cutting his golden eyes toward Shin. “Well, from what I heard from the grapevine, your old man isn’t feeling your idea either.”  
  
“Nope. He is very, very much against it” Shin muttered.  
  
“Can’t blame him. Took you somewhere where the future should look a lot different than running the possibility of dying on someone else’s chessboard.”  
  
Shin groaned at that, exasperated, “Is that how we’re supposed to live, Joe? Just thinking ‘this might kill me today’?”  
  
“Ah, yea, you’re a Subami kid now. That’s Wasaba thinking” Joe nodded.  
  
…Mm. Joe smirked at him suddenly, “Speaking of, how’s your little girl friend that replaced me?”  
  
“She did not…”  
  
“Psh, whatever, bro. I would have let her replace me too” Joe laughed.  
  
While Shin had about a half dozen or so friends in Wasaba, it all sort of drifted into oblivion when he left. Except Joe. It was rare and probably insanity but Joe, starting at six or seven, would set out from time to time to come the HOUR to their house on his bike. That was ACTUALLY the reason Shin got lost and ended up in Okamoto Lyla’s yard, he was trying to pull the same stunt with clearly not half the navigational skill.   
  
All the same, Joe was like a…four times a year visit. He had met Lyla a few times as well in passing but generally she was always busy at that time so they didn’t know each other that well. Joe advised him when they were eleven, alas, that she was going to be ‘hot’ when they got older. Figures.  
  
“She’s all right. They have her at some ‘wifeliness’ school or something bogus. I ate out with her before I came here” Shin muttered.  
  
“So like, ‘ate out’ or--”  
  
“No. Food. FOOD.”  
  
Joe grinned mischievously, “You can tell me, friend: you two bumped nasties before?”  
  
Gaping lightly, Shin shook his head, “…I don’t know what that means.”  
  
“Bumped and grinded in the sack, put fish in her net, saddled your pony--”  
  
Holding up a hand, Shin droned, “…If it’ll end your metaphorical shenanigans, yea, we have…twice. And that’s it. I’m…I’m not really comfortable with our relationship going in that direction, she’s my best friend.”  
  
Of course, what he was feeling today didn’t seem to be following that thought process… Joe also snorted. “Oh really? So what if I coaxed her into the vertical tango with me?”  
  
… “What?”  
  
“I invite her over one day, we talk, I get her interested in riding the train, boom. You cool with that?”  
  
Staring at Joe for a solid minute, Shin tried to process the mere premise of Lyla having any sort of relations with Joe. Really, he…had no actual idea of what Lyla’s type was. He was her type, apparently, but that seriously could have just been because they’d known each other their entire lives. She never mentioned if she thought Parsley was attractive or anything…  
  
…It wasn’t like them having sex had much preamble so she may actually be okay with a quick flighty thing? And if Joe was her type, then…  
  
Shin’s eyes narrowed, drinking his beer slowly. It was a little…different with Parsley. He was probably more jealous than he was ready to willingly accept but it wasn’t the same. There were new pieces at play now and…   
  
“…Nah, I would not be cool with that.”  
  
“Well, at least you can be that honest with yourself” Joe snickered.  
  
…Meh. Joe picked up his house phone, “I’m about to order a pizza and get some more beer. I haven’t eaten since like eleven this morning. Trying to leave my saving’s account a little stacked while I’m in boot camp.”  
  
“Oh, that’s a good idea” Shin blinked.  
  
If he’d been thinking about it, he would have worked a job like his brothers and had a stash away too so he could have just gotten an apartment. Guess he wasn’t thinking he’d need one though…  
  
“Hey, you mind if I crash here tonight, Joe? I’m…I’m not trying to keep putting this drain on my dad right now.”  
  
Joe pressed the receiver to his ear, his bushy brow drooping but he nodded. “Of course, man.”  
  
The glutton proceeded to order like three pizzas and advised he’d pay the delivery man extra if he stopped off and got them some Kirin Lager. Oh boy.  
  
When Joe was done with the call, he tapped the phone to his chin suddenly. “…You know, I have the lease on this apartment for three more months. It’s the same old super from when you and your dad were here, I bet he’d let you sign the additional three months until you ship out if you wanted to take over.”  
  
…Eh? “O-Oh. You…you think that’d be cool?”  
  
“Yea, I’m only paying like five thousand pieces a month and utilities are stupid cheap. You get a basic ass job, you should make it easy. And it’s Wasaba of course but like, no one comes here to pull any shit because they’d be caught right damn away. It’s peaceful enough.”  
  
In a backward way, he got what Koji was saying now. The Yagami way was there would be some stupid amount of obstacles and some heightened case of danger or potential death. When they thought they were down and out, they…just needed to hold strong and something kind of just neatly dropped in their lap. He wasn’t certain he trusted that mercy for when he was out serving his tour of duty but…he got it. Don’t give in until it was absolutely over.  
  
Of course, his dad was going to murder him for moving back to Wasaba but hey…the Yagami way.  
 _  
_XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
“…I thought you stopped drinking liquor.”  
  
Yagami Yamada stared into the distance, swirling a glass of whiskey as he sat in the chair near the large glass doors leading to the balcony in his shared bedroom with his wife. She had just gotten in from something or the other, wearing a blue dress and a pair of heels. He gazed absently into the amber liquid as he pressed it to his lips before shrugging.  
  
“Well, my son is _back_ in Wasaba so guess I might as well go back there too.”  
  
Dana groaned, sitting on the end of the bed some paces away and taking off her shoes. “Yamada--”  
  
“It’s not logical—it’s actually pretty stupid, really, but, sometimes, I think of Shin being _my_ son and the twins being _your_ sons. They’re all our sons equally and we’ve raised them together more than we raised them apart but my mind makes that distinction” he muttered.  
  
Shrugging, Dana reached up to take off her earrings, “It’s fine, sometimes I do think the same thing myself. It is what it is.”  
  
“Yea, well, I always thought _your_ sons would be doing the insanity. Yet, here we are.”  
  
Giving him a look, Dana stood to walk over and cross her arms, “ _Our_ son is an adult now and is making decisions for himself.”  
  
“ _Stupid_ decisions, Dana!” Yamada leered, “Dana, it may not have _seemed_ like it, but I was coming to terms with the army part. I researched on the internet, got into fights on forums with people calling these poor kids ‘boots on the ground’ like they’re just robots out there or something—honestly, there are tons of military fields I thought would be excellent for Shin! He could have been a medic like my grandfather if it struck him or a translator—solid jobs! Yes, it seems like he’s leaning more toward the combat but…I was coming to terms, I was getting _okay_ with it.”  
  
Standing to pace, he took a strong sip of his drink before pouring himself some more at their wet bar, “But, lo and behold, I discover he’s thinking about being a _cop_. A _cop,_ Dana. And he is _my son_ so he is going to aim to be a _good cop_. So either A, he’s going to get eaten alive by the congregation of _bad cops_ or B, he’s going to run right into some dangerous situation with all his good intentions and get _killed._ From warzone A to warzone _B_.”  
  
Dana just sighed as he threw his free hand up, “And the cherry on top of this entire whole disaster is now— _now,_ he has moved _back into Wasaba_. And not only _back into Wasaba_ , he moved back into the _very building I moved us out of_! It’s-it’s like he deconstructed and obliterated _every literal thing_ I was trying to get him away from! _Your_ sons, yea, they’re all up in Wasaba partying—but they carry themselves back to this side of town after, work over here, and aren’t trying to _move there_! I don’t _get it_!”  
  
She grabbed his hand, pulling him to sit, “…Yama, you are slightly to blame for this. You have a son that adores you and looks up to you, that has always only felt your love and support. Now, suddenly, you’ve snatched that rug from underneath him, being this hard ass version of yourself. _I_ know where it’s coming from but to the kids, this is coming out of complete left field. We have _never_ told our kids they couldn’t pursue a particular career or they couldn’t live in a certain place. Yes, we’ve told them not to _go_ to Wasaba but that’s just…general. You’re just coming off strict right now.”  
  
“Then _talk to me_. Tell me what this-this _is_. What’s the end goal? What’s even the _beginning_ goal? _Why are you back in Wasaba when I bought a whole damn mansion_?”  
  
Dana smirked as he buried his face in his hands, shaking his head, “He’s back in Wasaba after you bought a whole damn mansion because you’ve actually told him you’re disappointed in him for his decisions, Yama. You let yourself get so angry you just call him out of the blue to blow up on him and now, he’d rather be _anywhere_ else than this home you secured because you wanted our children to be safe. He doesn’t feel secure here.”  
  
…Ugh. Yamada surfaced, heavy eyed, before murmuring, “…You said you’d carry my faith, Dana, so I…give it to you. We’ll see how it plays out.”  
  
She smiled, kissing his forehead before tugging off her dress. “Oh…yea. So, uh, another interesting fact about our son?”  
  
Yamada took his drink down in one gulp, “…What?”  
  
“Um, guess he might have gotten a thing for Lyla at some point?”  
  
With a frown, Yamada glanced around, “…Well, that’s…the least surprising thing he’s done in a while. Are they…together?”  
  
Dana went to her large closet for night clothing, shrugging, “I don’t think so. I think they are in some sort of…test phase, remnant of our early relationship?”  
  
…God. Shin was his son.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _Okay, that night? It was on him.  
  
Lyla had been packed and ready to go when he went to get her around seven on New Years Eve, seeming quite excited. Shin was a little concerned because, well, he now had his own place. Joe was leaving tomorrow but he had decided to go visit his mom before he went to boot camp, the woman living in Kyoto with her husband. Interestingly, Joe said he was never quite ‘welcome’ there, at least not by his ‘stepdad’. Putting it into perspective, Shin…may have been being too dramatic with this thing with his dad. Like Koji had said, they could sit down and talk this out. Maybe…tomorrow, he had told himself. Right now? He had an empty apartment with Lyla.  
  
“Ooh, this is so different, Shin.”  
  
He blinked as they entered the fairly humble abode. Joe had stored some of his amenities with his grandpa, leaving behind stuff like the couch, television, and pots and pans and asking that Shin make sure he get it sent to his Grandpa Bacchus as well when Shin went overseas. All Shin had to purchase was the bed…  
  
At first, his siblings weren’t…too thrilled. He really had just been away anyway and now he had left all together. Alas, that did not last long AT ALL as they realized he was on like the outskirts of Wasaba so he wasn’t REALLY breaking dad’s mantra and they came and visited him like a dozen times in the three days since he moved in. The twins had ALREADY used him as a place to crash after an apparently very wild night at the club. Glad to be of use, he guessed.  
  
Lyla looked around curiously, still holding her bag. Eh, he…could sleep on the couch? It was only one bedroom so he had no guest space for her and…well, it was rudely presumptuous to think they’d sleep together. Right?  
  
“…I mean, it’s like, you have your own space” Lyla remarked, wide-eyed, “This is yours.”  
  
“Weird, right?” Shin chuckled, taking her luggage to put in his room. “…I’ve never been totally by myself, honestly. Even at bootcamp, so…this is really weird for me.”  
  
At home, he lived with seven people. Even with his parents being away a lot, he lived with almost half a dozen people. In bootcamp, he was in a barracks with thirty people. Now? Having spent every corner of his life with at least SOMEONE around, he was completely alone and it…  
  
…Okay, yea, it slightly bothered him. He just wasn’t used to it, it was so…quiet. He had FIVE SIBLINGS, there was never QUIET. And staying with thirty guys for half a year? NEVER quiet except when they were asleep. But here, there was just walls of silence and he would be left alone with these…thoughts. Like his dad had said, his imagination was apparently way more vivid than he thought it was. He started to just turn the television on for white noise. It wouldn’t matter long, he had found a job at the nearby grocery store and would be working six to eight hours a day. Tie in going to visit the family or Lyla and that easily ate up any time he might just be sitting there, daydreaming.   
  
Lyla had frowned though, coming and hugging him, “…Are you sure you don’t want to go home? I don’t want you to feel lonely.”  
  
Lonely… “Well, it’s something I need to conquer anyway, Lai. Koji and Nelly are gonna be off at college soon and the kids probably will too. I won’t always have people around, y’know?”  
  
She didn’t say anything. It’d be nice if she said she’d always be around but…the circumstances weren’t looking great.  
  
He put on a cream colored sweater when they were getting ready for the festival, dark colored jeans, and some brown boot-like shoes. Glancing in the mirror in the bathroom, he idly picked up his dog-tags and put them on. Strangely, they…had become sort of normal to him, these…things to identify his body if they needed to.  
  
Cringing, he wandered back out and paused, startled.  
  
Lyla was coming out of the bedroom, carrying a pair of brown boots. “I wanted to wear the heels but since we’re walking…”  
  
She…was wearing the dress he got her for Christmas to match said heels, this floral dress that…he wasn’t aware would cut that deep in the chest area. She was pulling on a wool lined jean jacket, shaking her curly hair from underneath the collar. Like…damn. “…You look really nice, Lyla.”  
  
“So silly” she teased, passing him to put on the boots near the door, “I suppose I should say you’re handsome too.”  
  
“Only if you mean it” he snickered, picking his keys up off the small counter.  
  
She gazed at him solemnly as he opened the front door to head out, slipping her hand into his. “You’re always handsome, Yagami Shin.”  
  
…Okay, it was A LITTLE her too._

 _  
They drove to Subami to meet the others at the festival. His parents were off in Tokyo at a party for the New Year so, somewhat thankfully, it was just the kids…Shin still hadn’t spoken to his father yet since moving.  
  
“Hey!”  
  
Shin looked up, smiling and waving when he saw the twins and kids. Shaun looked FRANTIC. “C’mon! We’ll have to wait forever for mochi!”  
  
Jeez. Shin glanced at Jill before finding his brow raising. She was wearing a jean mini skirt over some leggings and a fancy white t-shirt with bedazzled flowers. Um… “You going somewhere, imoto-chan?”  
  
Koji leered as Jill just…beamed. “Kibby’s cousin who is my age is having a party in the basement and Kibby invited me so I’m going to the same party as my BELOVED nii-sans.”  
  
“A.k.a. I’m not drinking on New Years” Koji sulked.  
  
Nelly just shook his head as Shin glowered. And exactly who cleared such a thing? “Well, I guess I will ALSO be stopping by.”  
  
“You guys suck” Jill pouted. “We’re just going to be playing DDR!”  
  
“Then you won’t mind me checking to see you just playing ‘DDR’” Shin said reasonably.  
  
Lyla smirked at him as Jill rolled her eyes, tipping her head, “I’m going to go get some cocoa if that’s okay with my MASTERS.”  
  
Koji snorted, waving a hand, “Tony’s already run off and the kid’s chasing candy. You go meander too, just be careful. And if you see Shaun, tell him I’ll fight him if he blows that entire five hundred piece I gave him.”  
  
Snickering, Jill nodded before skipping off. Shin gazed after her absently before cutting his eyes at Koji, “What the hell is DDR?”  
  
“Wow, I’m going to need you to get it together, nii-san, you act like you’re fucking ninety” Koji laughed.  
  
Shin smacked at him as Koji ducked, Nelly grinning and pointing, “THAT’S DDR, Shin.”  
  
Wha? Nelly started walking and they all followed. In a tented area, a bunch of kids and teenagers were…stomping some arrows on a mat very quickly to match arrows popping up on the screen. Shin watched for a few minutes before drawling, “…Okay, maybe I DON’T need to go supervise this…?”  
  
Lyla giggled, “It looks fun, silly!”  
  
…Did it? The knuckleheads made them wait in line for a turn and he knew as soon as he got on the apparatus, he was doomed to failure. Lyla joined him on the other side. He groaned when some super electronica song came on. ‘Butterfly’. ‘I’ve been searching for a man all across Japan’. What now?  
  
…Huh, weird. Koji who was standing beside Lyla, munching on chips, suddenly snickered. “Wow, I was expecting you to really suck at this. They have you marching rhythmically in boot camp?”  
  
“Shaddap” Shin huffed, now understanding why the bar was behind them now as he gripped it for dear life.  
  
Lyla laughed, also pretty coordinated as she matched almost perfectly, “Yeesh, I didn’t think I was-was this badly out of shape.”  
  
“I really SHOULD NOT BE” Shin grunted, feeling a bead of sweat roll down his brow.  
  
Screw jogging, he just needed to set this up in his apartment, damn. Getting through about three songs, he ducked out to give the other kids in line a chance. Wiping his forehead, he groaned, “…I mean, I guess that was fun.”  
  
“Well, one thing we are universally not used to is exercising as a video game” Nelly joked.  
  
“I liked it” Lyla pouted, “You two should have played.”  
  
“Shit, me and Nelly are going to get a mat for the house when the Playstation 2 comes out in two months” Koji assured, “We’re DDR MASTERS.”  
  
Shin gaped. “The WHAT? Playstation 2?”  
  
“Yea, seems like Sony isn’t going the Nintendo route and renaming the console every time, at least right now” Nelly explained, “It’s just the second generation.”  
  
Weird…but also weirdly practical. Lyla smiled, holding Shin’s arm as they walked through the stalls. “Definitely come a long way from Duck Hunt…”  
  
“Fuck, we were playing that two consoles ago” Nelly whistled, “Man, are we getting old?”  
  
“Says the seventeen year old” Shin snorted.  
  
“We KNOW you’re a grandpa!”  
  
“You were born BARELY a year after me!”  
  
These knuckleheads. They wandered around until about 11, locating the younger three so they could start to gather for the countdown.   
  
…That was the beginning of his mistake? Lyla and he were old enough to get wine while the others got juice. At 11:59, Koji jeered and said to get ready for the robot apocalypse and for all the computers to explode. Lyla looked confused so Nelly gave the brief ‘concerns’ up until the ten second mark. Shin coughed to not laugh when she grabbed his hand tight, seeming alarmed. He squeezed back warmly. Well, if it was about to go down, at least he was with his favorite people in the world. Almost all of them anyway.  
  
At the stroke of twelve, the crowd cheered ‘Happy New Year’ into the uneventful new millennium. Shin grinned as they all tapped their glasses together and wished each other a good year, the elders laughing and shaking their head at Shaun’s disappointment that the Terminator hadn’t come. Crazy kid.  
  
“You really coming to Keiba’s party, Shin?”  
  
Shin frowned as they started to walk toward their cars, looking to Koji who was driving the other procession. “…I can for a second, I guess? You want to, Lai?”  
  
“Of course. I haven’t seen Keiba in a while” Lyla nodded.  
  
“Okay. I’ll follow you” Shin nodded.  
  
Wine didn’t exactly affect him that hard, thankfully, but…it was alcohol and it was kind of resting there in his system, just…waiting to come snatch him off the rails. As far as he was concerned, whatever actually…happened after he parked his car at Keiba’s house was a dream.  
  
So, what may have happened? He walked in and it was packed with high school kids. Tony, Jill, and Shaun rushed off to the basement where the apparently younger crowd was. Shin’s entire intention was just to keep an eye on that situation, a lot could happen in a basement party.   
  
Except, oops. “Shin, you gotta try this, man. It’s called ‘AMF” Koji had said, wandering over with a red cup of some blue colored concoction.  
  
Shin sighed, taking it and taking a sip. Raising a brow, he looked to Lyla who was simply observing. “Want a sip, Lai?”  
  
“O-Oh, I’m not used to drinking” she fretted.  
  
“You don’t have to” he smiled, taking another sip. It tasted a little strong but had a good sweet flavor he thought she might like.  
  
Lyla shook her head, taking the cup and drinking it, “Oh! That’s okay. What it’s called again, Koji?”  
  
“Amf.”  
  
“That’s a weird name” Lyla blinked, confused.  
  
Koji nodded, handing Shin a cup of something else entirely now as he stood over an inconspicuous tub of punch. “It stands for ‘Adios Motherfucker’.”  
  
…Shin and Lyla had stared at him as he just casually walked away after that piece of information. Shin sipped the punch and found it didn’t seem that strong either. Keiba probably had to make these drinks weak. “…I’m sure it’ll be fine, Lai. Just…probably don’t drink any more than that.”  
  
“Okay” she smiled, following him as he went to find a place for them to sit.  
  
When they sat, Shin noticed some guys had started to look at Lyla. Yea, she was pretty cute right now. Except a lot were kind of looking BACK at her. She…did have a cute butt too but jeez, why be so obvious? He pulled her close when they sat down. While even he didn’t know what they were right now, he could give other people an ‘idea’.  
  
While it was raucous with the music playing and everything, it was kind of nice. He got up to get a couple more cups of the punch before sitting back down to continue speaking with Lyla. She was probably a lightweight so about thirty minutes into the convo, she started to giggle. “You have such nice lips, Shin. They’re so soft and nice…”  
  
He smirked, giving her a kiss. “You don’t have to say weird serial killer things to kiss me, Lai.”  
  
She laughed, shoving him and rubbing his leg. That’s…probably where he really, really lost grasp on reality?   
  
“Shin, are you okay?” Lyla might have asked after another thirty minutes, twirling her hair around her finger.  
  
Lyla had the nicest, thickest legs, the roundest ass, and the nicest tits. He still didn’t get to suck them last time. He wanted to suck her tits. He had been looking at all this when she asked. “Wh-Why ya’ ask that…?”  
  
“Your eyes are kind of wild” she tilted her head.  
  
“I…I wanna take you home now” Shin drawled, “Lez’…lez’ go back to my place, Lyla. I want you back at my place.”  
  
Lyla pouted, “But I thought you were watching the kids?”  
  
The kids? The kids were here? He squinted, shaking his head, “I-I don’-I don’ think the…the kids are here, Lai. They’re babies. Lez…lez go back to my place.”  
  
It just so happened that Koji was passing by to probably get a refill when he must’ve noticed something was off. “Uh…Shin, how many cups of Jungle Juice have you had there, man?”  
  
“Thuh…thuh punch? I-I had like…like five, six cups of thuh punches…”  
  
“Ho-ly shit.”  
  
What? It was…just punch. Koji cleared his throat, taking out his phone, “Yea-a-a-a, I’m going to call you a cab.”  
  
A cab? He had a whole car! “Do-Don’t do that, asshole. I-I have a-a car.”  
  
“A car you will very swiftly wreck with the amount of booze you have in your system, bro” Koji THANKFULLY said calmly, “Give me your keys.”  
  
“T-Thuh fuck for? No.”  
  
“Gimme your keys, Shin.”  
  
“No.”  
  
“Shin, I WILL fight you.”  
  
If any one moment should have said Shin was drunk, it was that one because he challenged, “You think I can’t take your ass?”  
  
Well, Shin wasn’t THAT gone because Koji smiled at him. Except it wasn’t some coddling smile or humoring of any sort, it was very much ‘try me, motherfucker’. Shin grabbed the keys out of his pocket and threw them at Koji, “Yo-your ass figh’s crazy anyways…”  
  
“I do” Koji agreed, dialing something on his cell phone.   
  
Lyla rubbed his hand, looking concerned, “Shin, are you sure you’re okay?”  
  
“Of course I’m okay, Lai” he assured, reaching to stroke her hair, “You’re so damn cute, y’know that? I-I won’ fight Koji b-but I’ll fight ev’ry bastard in here that wants to take you away.”  
  
“What are you talking about?” Lyla leered.  
  
Koji blinked languidly, “Yea-a-a, Lyla, he is probably going to be very out of character right now so if you wanna stay until he sobers up…”  
  
“Oh no…well, I’ll take him home and get him to bed” Lyla assured, “I think my drink is wearing off a bit.”  
  
Koji was RIGHTFULLY concerned but, by some disaster, they ended up in the back of a cab heading toward Wasaba after Koji paid the driver. Whatever version of himself that was entirely wasted was just entirely fixated on Lyla and that fragrant fruity smell she had. In the back of the cab car, he…might have started feeling up her inner thigh?  
  
“Shin” she hissed, glowering rebukingly at him.  
  
“Lyla, you smell so fucking good” he growled into her ear, kissing her neck.  
  
She nudged him away, “Stop it. You can’t give me hickeys, I have to go back to school in a few days.”  
  
“Tha’z fine…I can give you hickeys everywhere else…”  
  
Giving a sulky moue, Lyla stroked his hair back, “Yagami Shin, you are absolutely out of it right now. I’ve never seen you act like this.”  
  
“Cuz I wanna fuck tonight, Lai. T-The other two times, I wasn’t really fucking you like I could but I-I’m gonna fuck you tonight…”   
  
Lyla raised a brow at him as they started to pull in front of his apartment. Yea, completely GONE. But, well, LUCKILY, even the drunk ass version of himself had some scruples. “N-No, wai-wayment. Lai, can I fuck you tonight?”  
  
The cab driver was just making the turn as she absently looked up into the rearview mirror for some reason…before very briefly spreading her legs? Just enough so he could see she was not wearing panties and, well, that pretty much sealed drunk Shin’s deal.  
  
He drunk threw MORE money at the cab driver before pulling Lyla out of the cab with him, almost sprinting into the apartment complex. To his dismay, people were on the elevator with them and the ride to the third floor felt like an eternity. He barely let the doors open before he was pulling her through them, grabbing his apartment keys and struggling to get the door open.  
  
Lyla gasped when he pressed her hard against the front door the second he got them on the other side, grappling her thigh and pulling it up while kissing her hard. He ran his hand down her sex and growled, “Y-You’re not wet yet. I-I’mma-I’mma get yo-you wet.”  
  
Snatching off her jacket, he jerked the ends of her dress, pulling the article of clothing off of her and slinging it to the floor along with her bra. Fuck, her tits. Lyla yelped as he dry-lifted her off the ground and planted her on the counter, FINALLY wrapping his mouth around her nipple.  
  
“Mm, Shin…”  
  
He felt the nub get hard in his mouth as his own drool ran down his jaw, he was sucking so hard. Tugging off his shirt before unzipping his pants and letting them fall to the ground, he finally came up to breathe before pulling her pussy flush against his thigh, playing with her clit and grinding his leg against her. She whimpered into his kiss, taking a hard breath, “W-Wait, Shin.”  
  
“A-Am I hurting you?”  
  
“N-No, j-just--”  
  
She was starting to get turned on just when he realized. Jerking his leg away, he purred, “I’m going to eat you out, Lyla.”  
  
“W-What? What does that mean?”  
  
“I’mma suck your pussy, Lai.”  
  
He wasn’t sure if she was exactly…understanding that. Probably not but he picked her up, carrying her to bed and basically brought her lower body TO his face. Lyla freaked, “Shin! What are you doing??”  
  
If she was put off, it…only seemed to be for a second. His tongue spun rapidly around her clit, sucking the pink flesh hard. She rasped, “A-Ah, n-nnn. Wha--”  
  
He inhaled, pulling so hard his cheeks got taut. Lyla’s body was writhing, her whimpers so pitchy and erotic in his ears. Shin chuckled at the way she was almost grinding into his face. Pulling away and licking his lips, he slid his finger into her convulsing flesh. “You like that, Lai?  
  
“Y-Yes” she mumbled shyly.  
  
“So fucking cute” he growled, going back in…for seconds?  
  
Lyla cried out, her body shaking as she climaxed, trembling as he relaxed her on the bed. He stared as she recovered. Yea, he HAD to have been deadass WASTED because he was pretty sure he hadn’t lucidly requested anything close SINCE. He reached out and pinched her nipple, gnawing his lower lip. “Lyla…?”  
  
“Y-Yes, Shin?” she whispered.  
  
“I…I want my cock in your mouth.”  
  
Yea, even Lyla looked a little, oh, shocked he would be THAT forward. But she reached out and jerked his length, nodding. He eagerly knelt on the bed so she could turn, tenderly licking the head before drawing it into her mouth, her tongue teasingly running down his shaft. Closing his eyes, he groaned and gazed down. Oh…he could still finger her from right here.  
  
She moaned over his penis, her green eyes popping open and vivid in the twilight as she gazed up at him. He wriggled his fingertips against her silky sex, biting his lip as he pumped the digits deep. Lyla started to whine again, pulling her mouth away to pout at him. “I-I thought you wanted me t-to please you. I-I can’t focus.”  
  
He grinned saucily, reaching just a bit further and earning him that sugary cry he wanted. There was debate on whether the whole ‘g-spot’ was real or not but he knew that Lyla liked it, her legs involuntarily shaking. She sulked at him and grabbed his cock again, sucking his balls.   
  
Something really should have signaled to himself that he was off his rocker, it really should have, that’s what he kept coming back to. His head was SPINNING but he came all over her face. PURPOSEFULLY. Again, she looked a little surprised, the cum running down her cheeks and all. Oh, and he was SO pleased with himself! “Sorry, Lai…I think I kind of just wanted to see that once.”  
  
Which WHY? She swiped a bit off her jaw and stuck her finger in her mouth, staring up at him with a raised brow. Oh yea, they weren’t done. He grabbed a few tissues and wiped her face gently, huskily muttering, “I’m going to dick you up, Lyla.”  
  
“You’re really drunk, Shin.”  
  
Yea, and the worst part was he was getting DRUNKER. It was like his body was still steady absorbing and starting to mix with that wine from earlier to make an abomination of insanity. Of course, like any other drunk person, he insisted he WASN’T. She didn’t even seem startled anymore when he picked her up off the bed and just slid his shaft into her.   
  
He swallowed, his hips rolling smoothly between her legs. He remembered Koji joking to Nelly in some miscellaneous conversation that ‘no matter how messed up you are, your stroke game better be correct or you’ll leave a terrible impression’. Well, he hoped, he was seeing about two of Lyla right now, his count might be off.  
  
“Mmph, mm… I-I like this position, Shin” Lyla murmured into his ear.  
  
“What else do you like, Lyla?” he teased, out of breath.  
  
Pouting, she hugged his neck, “You’re-you’re silly, Shin.”  
  
“Uh uh…do you like this dick, Lyla?”  
  
“I will never, ever, EVER say that, Yagami Shin.”  
  
Shin snickered, “C’mon, say it. You like this hard cock, don’t you?”  
  
For whatever reason, she just giggled…before knocking him back. He yelped, feeling like he was sent cascading into a free-fall as she sat on top of him, now riding him. “Do you like…like this…whatever you call it?”  
  
Grinning lazily, he reached up and grabbed her tits, “I love your pussy and these beautiful tits…but the question was…”  
  
She laughed as he tackled her back, grinding hard, “Do you like this dick?”  
  
“I’ll never tell, it’s simply not ladylike” she stuck out her tongue.  
  
Ol’ Crazy Drunk Shin. “Tell me anyway.”  
  
“I love you?”   
  
“And-d-d-d?”  
  
She blushed and whispered lowly in his ear, “I like your dick, you big jerk.”  
  
Chuckling, he hugged her to his body, “I love you too, Lyla.”  
  
He kissed her intensely, his tongue rolling around hers as he fought coming. She was moaning, her hair a sticky sweaty mess as he tried to get her to…finish. She gave him a look, “You first.”  
  
“No, no, l-ladies first.”  
  
“I-I’ve al-already twice.”  
  
“Y-Yea, just one more t-to go.”  
  
“N-Nooo” she whined, gripping his back.  
  
Shin snorted…before jerking out and fingering her spot again. She actually seemed a little angry as she orgasmed, stammering, “D-Damn it, Shin.”  
  
Amused, he stroked her hair and drawled into her ear, “You wanna taste how good your pussy is?”  
  
“What? No.”  
  
“Aww, you won’t suck my dick again?”  
  
“Oh. Wipe it off.”  
  
Lyla was so matter of fact, it almost sobered him up as he laughed, turning around, “Fine, I’ll enjoy how good your pussy tastes again…”  
  
He licked her very swollen slit, moaning, “Your cum’s so sweet, Lyla…”  
  
Gnawing his lip as her juices ran down her skin, again, totally unhinged, he started to finger a little…more south of the border. Lyla JUMPED. “Shin! That-that’s not the right place!”  
  
“Oh, Lai, it’s all the right place.”  
  
Fingering her pussy, her ass, and licking her clit, Lyla started groaning his name in ecstasy. She was so flexible, he loved it. Or…drunk Shin did? Or whatever version it was because he was seriously thinking he was dreaming at this point. Especially when SHE asked if…his dick could go ‘in the other place’. Well, they sure could try.  
  
…Definitely screwing into a new millennium.  
  
_XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
“Oh…my God…”  
  
Shin woke up lying flat on his stomach, his mouth completely agape and drooling, his tongue dry as sandpaper. When he opened his eyes, Satan’s sun was there to incinerate them while his denizens hammered a hole into his brain. What in the _hell_ happened last night?  
  
He cringed as he touched his face and…literally _everything_ was sticky, from his fingers to his cheeks, what the hell. And if he was sleeping in bed, where was Lyla?   
  
Turning over onto his side to face the usually empty part of the bed, he stared at Lyla. Her hair was…just _wildly_ thrown everywhere, her lips were swollen and bruised, and that was, a hundred percent without a doubt, dried semen on her face. _What in the hell_?  
  
While everything in his body said ‘no, your dumbass is lying right here until you perish’, he forced himself up and picked up his alarm clock. Wow, great, 12 in the afternoon. Dazed, he tugged the blanket tighter over the deeply asleep Lyla and kissed her forehead. “…I am so sorry for whatever I apparently did to you last night.”  
  
He dragged himself to the bathroom. The only thing that had mercy on him was his bladder that was shortly about to explode. After, he slipped into the shower and took a long, hot, soak. Okay, try to…remember.  
  
…He vaguely recalled asking if Lyla liked his…wait a minute.  
  
Drying off quickly, he pulled on a clean pair of jeans and a white t-shirt, coming back to his bedroom where Lyla was horribly starting to wake up. He almost _ran_ into the kitchen and living room. _Dude_.  
  
He stared at his clothes and her clothes just scattered across the room near the door. Things were slowly starting to come back. Or, things he had assumed he was just mindlessly fantasizing about but, apparently, no. No, he…very much made Lyla give him a blowjob last night.  
  
Sobbing, he buried his face in his hands, his head still pulsing unmercifully. What _hated him so much_? Going to his coffee maker to pour the grinds into the filter, he grimaced when he heard the shower turn on, thankful she wandered past him without saying anything. Oh God, he was about to _die_ , he was so embarrassed. She probably remembered every _single thing_. Why?  
  
“ _Why would you let me take Lyla home, Koji?”  
  
_ Having located his cell phone, he immediately called the miscreant that started this whole nightmare. Alas, Koji sounded like he’d drank a box of nails as he rasped, “…Shin, I’m almost ready to answer that question with a ‘fuck you’ but I am going to attempt to not allow my brain to explode and ask ‘why?’ instead.”  
  
“Was I _drunk_ when I left the party last night, Koji?” Shin demanded.  
  
Koji was quiet for a second…before his light breathing signaled he’d fallen _asleep_. “KOJI.”  
  
“Huh? Oh, uh, yea, you were done, bro. You had like five, six cups of Jungle Juice per your count.”  
  
Shin leered, “Jungle Juice is just…just vodka and rum. Yea, it can be _rough_ but--”  
  
Koji chuckled. It wasn’t a casual chuckle, it was a sinister chuckle even with his raspy voice. “Koji.”  
  
“So, rum? You know Bacardi 151? And Balkan Vodka? Oh, and Everclear?”  
  
Shin wished he could strangle Koji through the phone. “So the damn _blackout special_ then, Koji.”  
  
“Oh-ho yea” Koji drawled, “I didn’t think you were that heavy a drinker though. When I came down to get some more and you had said something a little crazy to Lyla and you were like ‘I’ve only had five cups’, I was like, yep, gotta get him out of here.”  
  
“But _with Lyla_?” Shin hissed, grabbing a mug out of the cabinet, “You know I drank pure damn liquor and let me take her with me?”  
  
Koji suddenly groaned, “…Shit. I told her to stay until you sobered up and I’d take her home but she was like, ‘I’m going to take him home and get him into bed’. What…what happened?”  
  
“What _didn’t happen?”_ he said under his breath, glancing over his shoulder. The water was still running.  
  
“Meaning…?”  
  
“Meaning, because I apparently became a drunk ass _slut bucket_ last night, I gave her a _facial_ and, if my apparent memory isn’t too faulty, we might have done anal.”  
  
Koji was smirking, he could see it. “I mean, man, that sounds like a good New Years’ night to me. You got me on the anal but I was on the same track.”  
  
Gritting his teeth and shaking his head as he poured sugar into his coffee, he growled, “I _think_ I said ‘I want my…member in your mouth’ to her, Koji. I don’t _ask_ for… _that._ I…take and graciously receive.”  
  
He expected Koji to scoff but the slightly younger replied, “I feel you. But I guess the real question is, how does she feel about last night?”  
  
UGH. “Koji, she’s in there blow drying her hair right now, I don’t even want to face her.”  
  
“Dude, just say you’re sorry and you were clearly not yourself last night. And also discuss if she felt particularly forced because…damn, anal? I can’t convince any chick to let me do anal, what the fuck?”  
  
Shin squeezed the bridge of his nose, taking a deep breath, “Koji--”  
  
“Shin?”  
  
Actually _squeaking_ , he quickly wheeled around. Lyla was wearing a white sweater dress now, the sleeves a little big longer than her hands, her hair now kept and recurled, a rather…bland expression on her face. Oh, hell. “U-Uh, I’ll call you back, Koji.”  
  
Clicking off, he smiled nervously, sipping his coffee, “G-Good afternoon.”  
  
“Good afternoon.”  
  
She came beside him and retrieved a cup, pouring herself some of the coffee as he awkwardly looked away. Damn it. “U-Um, Lai?”  
  
His—God, his best friend, glanced at him as she poured sugar and creamer into her cup. “Yes, Shin?”  
  
“A-About—about last night, I-I was—I was _entirely_ out of my mind, I-I literally thought I was having some really wild dream. I-I would never—I mean, I-I really, really hope I-I didn’t force you into things you didn’t want to do. I-I take full responsibility” he insisted.  
  
Surprisingly, she made this incredulous face. “…I was about to apologize to _you_. You were clearly not in your right mind and I let you do what you want. If I’d said ‘let’s not do this right now’, I think you would have stopped and just passed out. You fell asleep… _during_.”  
  
He did what now? Embarrassed all the same, his face hot, he mumbled, “N-No, I-I mean, I-I put you in danger and that’s-that’s not good.”  
  
“Danger?” she echoed, “I never felt I was in danger or entirely out of control. I mean, you were very spontaneous when an idea crossed your mind but if I didn’t like it, I know I could have talked you out of it. You were just…uninhibited Shin.”  
  
“ _Unthinkably_ uninhibited Shin” he muttered into his cup.  
  
Lyla smiled, setting her mug down and hugging his waist, “Are you really embarrassed?”  
  
“ _Humiliated_.”  
  
“Don’t be” she pouted, playing with his hair.  
  
He frowned as she kissed him sweetly, murmuring, “I actually really liked it…”  
  
Well, damn. “O-Oh?”  
  
Nodding solemnly, she hugged his neck, “I know your family doesn’t traditionally, Shin, but…can we go to the temple today?”  
  
…Oh. “Uh, yea, Lai. Probably will be packed but I-I don’t mind.”  
  
“Did Koji say he was going to drop off the car?”  
  
“…Come again?”  
  
Lyla’s brow rose, “…You know you were _insanely_ drunk last night, right? Koji made you give him your keys.”  
  
“…And I’m never drinking again, oh my God.”  
  
She laughed, kissing his knuckles and releasing him to pick her cup of coffee up again. She wandered over to the couch, turning on the television like…he wasn’t some complete whore last night with her. Swallowing, he dialed for Koji to _bring his freakin’ car back_.   
  
Glancing back at her as she laughed about something on the screen, he took a long relieved breath. Okay, he…  
  
He…was embarrassed. What…really threw him though? Everything that happened last night was…was because…  
  
…He really wanted to do that to her.  
  
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 _Koji brought his car back, passing on the invite to the temple when they drove him back home to Subami. “Pray kami kills me before this hangover does. I need to come up with an elixir…”  
  
“You need not to drink MURDER” Shin huffed, driving through the city.  
  
Seriously, if Koji was drinking something like THAT concoction, no wonder he was getting into violent fights. That ‘potion’ tapped right into Shin’s latent…HO side like a drum. Koji snickered, slumped over in the backseat, “I dunno, I love Everclear…”  
  
Figures. “Were the kids okay, Koji?” Lyla frowned, “I don’t think anyone was looking out for them.”  
  
…Damn it! She was right! Koji groaned, closing his eyes, “I have to say with the most honest dismay that if Jill wanted to go all the way with some little bastard last night, she had ample and absolute opportunity, because, yes, not a one of us went to check on her. Alas, our dear sweet princess played Dance Dance Revolution as she said while even her own stupid twin and brother got into some Mike’s Hard.”  
  
“…Koji, what in the hell is ‘Mike’s Hard’?” Shin said flatly, gazing at the road ahead and starting to get irritated already.  
  
“It’s like Zima but lemonade. Like, five percent alcohol.”  
  
Shin’s brows furrowed. “…Uh, while I don’t want them to drink at the tender age of ‘just reached teens’, five percent was noticeable?”  
  
“Well, if you’re still kind of small and drink five of them…”  
  
Damn it! “Koji.”  
  
“I was assured by all three, despite it being possible all three were in cahoots, that it was assumed that they were just ‘lemonade’. They were drinking them in cups with ice. They weren’t even acting drunk. Tony said he had a headache and the kid was kind of giggly. That’s it. Jill…babysat all four of us and drove us home.”  
  
“I do believe that’s irony” Lyla smirked.  
  
It was nonsense, that’s what it was. Pulling up to the house, Shin leered as Lyla got out to let Koji out, “Are you DONE drinking?”  
  
“As in, for today?”  
  
“As in for LIFE.”  
  
Koji laughed dryly, leaning against the window after Lyla got back in. “You’re funny as shit. Mom told me to tell you to come home tonight for dinner, please.”  
  
Rolling his eyes, Shin waved a hand, “Tell her I’ll be there. We’ll see you in a bit.”  
  
Lyla giggled as Koji kissed her cheek, droning that she TRY to have fun with ‘that wet blanket’. It didn’t even MAKE SENSE. The KIDS got tipsy last night! No, no more drinking. That was done. Especially after…  
  
…He GOT it. There was something about losing hold of your inhibitions, the ones that made things more complicated than they need to be. Just, that made him have to come to terms with that fact that Lyla had turned from his platonic best friend to someone he secretly felt VERY strongly sexual about. Last night was not because he so happened to be horny or frustrated, it was because he wanted HER and he wanted HER in those ways.   
  
The first time they had sex felt so, so wrong. It was like betraying ALL of his mandates and what he understood about himself. All the same, he reflected and realized that no matter how he felt a trifle awkward that, he still felt…inclined. Inclined to what exactly? Well, make minor suggestions that they’d have ‘the house to themselves’ when they first got here. He was relieved when she offset that but in the back of his mind, they…  
  
The second time, he had just told Nelly he’d say ‘no’. Koji reasoned that he was a super pushover when it came to Lyla so he justified it with that but, c’mon! He didn’t even slightly try to stop her after she asked they not label whatever they were doing.  
  
Last night. Last night is where he was irritated the most. Last night, the second she came out of his room in that dress, he knew she became Lyla, his sexy best friend that he had a casual sexual relationship with. In his mind, if she had tried to seduce him that night, he would have gone along with it so very, very willingly. Last night, instead of HER making advances, when his barriers were crushed, he decided he was going to come onto her and do EVERYTHING he possibly could. She liked it. Great, he just…  
  
He just…might actually true to all want a relationship with her.  
  
Disgruntled as they pulled into the temple, he made a face as he parked, amazed by the amount of people coming to give their prayers and thanks. He needed some prayer, he had no thanks for whatever he was mixed up in right now. Lyla frowned as he unbuckled his seatbelt, “Shin, if you’re not feeling well, you can wait in the car.”  
  
“I’m fine, Lai” he said wearily, rubbing his brow, “I…I’m just thinking. C’mon.”  
  
They got out and, for the first time since that Nirvana concert almost seven years ago, he ALMOST avoided her holding his hand. But, no, if he did that, he’d feel worse than he already did. This…this was his problem.  
  
Like that concert, they weren’t actually directing themselves but were being carried along by the crowd. They happened to end up in line for the burning of the omamori but he didn’t have one. About to dive out of the crowd, when they got to the flame, Lyla pulled one out of her purse. Oh, right. She dropped it to the fire and pressed her hands together. Honestly, the Yagami family were not particularly…religious or whatever, so he had to admit some confusion beside what he’d seen in cartoons or drama. He just watched her until she was done. She smiled and said she was going to buy a new one and they should get the omikuji. Okay.  
  
Shin groaned to himself as they tried to navigate through all the people to the stalls. He needed a nap. This…this whole thing was frustrating. It felt like all of his established relationships were shifting to some place he didn’t really like. Just…  
  
His eyes widened when he felt Lyla’s hand disappear from his. Eh? Looking back, alarmed, he saw her pink hair but she was moving well away from him. “A-Ah, Lyla!?”  
  
About to elbow his way back toward her, he felt a hand on his shoulder. Turning, thinking it was just some random person trying to push him out of the way, he froze, startled. Yagami Yamada was patting him on the back. What? What was his dad doing here??  
  
“A-Ah, dad?? I-I didn’t know you came to temple.”  
  
“I don’t. But, your mother said an omikuji might be a change from my usual so I came to buy one. Dunno if this is like wishing on birthday candles and I’m not supposed to tell you but I got a han-kyo so, that’s great.”  
  
“Han-kyo?” Shin echoed, “Half curse?”  
  
His dad shrugged and nodded, “I’m not into this sort of thing.”  
  
“Oh, well, naturally I’m not either. Lyla wanted to come though. I guess she’s more knowledgeable of Shinto than I realized” Shin rubbed his arm.  
  
“Faith can be dangerous. It also can be greatly rewarding. Just depends what side of the coin you flip to, I guess” Yamada said simply.  
  
…Perhaps. “Y-Yea. You get good fortunes, at least? Or is that a thing?”  
  
“Eh, unrelated stuff. Machibito, usemono. I’m not waiting on anyone and I haven’t lost anything, to my recollection.”  
  
Hmm. “Maybe…your mom?”  
  
His dad smirked some, “Son, if I was waiting on THAT, I’d be a fool. Nah, it was a fun diversion. I met some old friends and whatnot but…well, I need to build my own ‘faith’ in matters.”  
  
Right. Yamada smiled, patting his shoulder again, “Let me head home and help your mother with dinner. I’ll see you tonight?”  
  
“A-Ah, yea, I’ll be there” Shin almost blurted. This…was like the least confrontational conversation they’d had? Maybe because they were in public but…  
  
“Good, good. And you two look good together.”  
  
What? “Shin!”  
  
Shin looked back, seeing Lyla’s pink hair as she tried to get through to him. When he turned back to his father to say something, he was startled to find the man was already heading out some paces away. Oh.  
  
Lyla caught up to him, her face a little pink in the cold. “I got you an omikuji, if you don’t mind. I don’t think it works if I draw it but…”  
  
Oh. “It’s fine, Lai. Thank you.”  
  
He accepted the slip of paper from her, kind of just absently opening it. Huh, he guessed the Yagami men were having an unlucky time. Dai-kyo was catastrophic. Reading his ‘bad fortune’, his brows furrowed. It was pretty grim, something along the lines of he’d look up to see the sun but it wouldn’t be there. Damn. Folding it and stuffing it in his pocket, he smiled some. “…Well, that’s something.”  
  
“Is it good? If it’s a bad fortune, you should leave it here” Lyla insisted.  
  
He looked over to the tree, seeing another hoard of people, and shook his head, “Nah, it was fine. How about yours?”  
  
“Great blessings” she gushed.  
  
Smiling at that, he retook her hand. “Which you fully deserve, Lai. C’mon, I want to get a nap before dinner tonight.”  
  
“Shin” she frowned deeply, grasping him to hold him, “I know your family isn’t superstitious but you should really leave bad fortune here.”  
  
“It was fine, Lai, really. I have you as my good fortune.”  
  
Lyla pouted at him but let the matter drop. Shin would never commit to say that THAT caused any one catastrophe his life faced in that year. It was still ‘superstition’.  
  
…But he had already said he was knocking on wood. If he ever got a bad omikuji again, he most definitely was leaving it behind._

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End Notes:

‘Yaya’ is Ayame from Tale of Two Towns. In Dirty, she’s the younger sister of Shin’s namesake and is inspired by Yamada to become a doctor after nannying for Shin up until he was five.

Joe is from Rune Factory Oceans/Tides of Destiny on the Nintendo Wii/PS3. Joe was a weird guy…but this story is _very_ Rune Factory heavy so expect to see a little more of him as it goes by.  
  
I’m SO DAMN OLD. Dance Dance Revolution is this arcade/video game where you tap the arrows to the beat of a song by Konami. It was _all_ the rage when I was in 8th grade through high school. I sucked _so hard_ at it. The song Shin notices a lyric from is “Butterfly” by SMiLE.dk.

The good ol’ PS2! Interestingly enough, Shin is based off Toy from Save the Homeland, one of the few Harvest Moon games released on the system. Technically his younger brothers are based off the farmers from the older series so a little bit of a flip.  
  
The “Adios Motherfucker” aka “Amf” is a combination of gin, vodka, rum, tequila, lemon lime soda, sweet and sour mix, and blue curacao.   
  
The liquors Koji mentions as being mixed into the Jungle Juice are some of the strongest available proof drinks of their kinds.   
  
I really do _not_ understand the fortune system for New Years in Japan. Let’s just call it a loose interpretation.  
  
  
  
  



	7. Adulthood

**Nomad,** Shin’s Story  
 **Chapter 7** : Adulthood

**Author’s Notes:** Welp, missed my Saturday update in ALL time zones this time! Here’s a Sunday update. My AO3 readers, this bad boy has like _three smut scenes._ If you’re here for the story and not the smutacularness, I’m also hosting it on FF.Net. I edited it a little bit better where remnants are there but not the…details.

Darker chapter near the end. I’m…a little surprised how quickly this is getting paced along? Like, we’re catching up to where I currently am writing a little faster than I was expecting. It’s cool, I’m…writing?

Enjoy!

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Adulthood sucked.  
  
Shin drearily walked up the steps of his apartment, realizing that taking the elevator for three flights of steps was super lazy for him to be doing. Getting to the second flight, he rubbed his eyes, yawning. He had been called in to work someone else’s shift at seven this morning. That, however, did not mean he didn’t have to work _his_ shift which had been from noon to 8 pm. Thus, oh, he worked something like eleven hours. Wasn’t even the first time this week, really.  
  
For the most part, he’d love to tell his boss to screw off but, fact of the matter was, he _needed_ that money. Yes, rent was cheap but, he got his first heating bill and needless to say, he was now wearing about two layers of clothing and a blanket around his apartment because no. No, that was not going to happen again. Water was high too because he liked nice hot, long showers. Then cable? And phone? Like, he really, really underestimated how much it cost to live, it was crazy.  
  
Sleepily coming to the front door of his apartment, Shin flipped through the keys a needless five times before his apartment key finally stood out enough to open his door. Well…one other thing wasn’t helping but he’d gladly and gratefully take that challenge.  
  
Okamoto Lyla was standing in the kitchen, humming, and apparently cooking. She was wearing some sweatpants he got her and one of his large Nike hoodies as she sipped a bit of soup. Looking back at him, she smiled, “Welcome home, Shin.”  
  
“Thanks, Lai…”  
  
He grimaced, wandering over to the couch to sit down and take off his shoes. She started to take dishes to probably make him a plate but he was _exhausted_. Thankfully, she made him a small portion and came to sit beside him after pouring him some water. “You were gone when I woke up this morning.”  
  
“Yea, sorry. I left a note…”  
  
She nodded as he slowly drank the warm broth. “…Koji-chan came by and took me to the house to practice driving. He thinks I’ll be ready to take my test soon.”  
  
“That’s awesome, Lai” he smiled.  
  
To his _massive_ regret, though he was the one to promise to teach her, his daylight time was getting filled with this stupid job. Koji volunteered to teach her in his stead during the day and Shin would take care of the night time if he had the energy to. She was good, just…a tiny bit slow but that was better than being a speed demon.   
  
She looked at him hopefully as he finished his soup and moved to the pickled vegetable. “You’re off tomorrow, right?”  
  
“Hopefully…”  
  
“Hopefully?”  
  
“I do get called in a lot.”  
  
“…Okay.”  
  
Shin frowned as she stood up with a sigh, going back to the kitchen to clean up dishes. What…?   
  
Since their New Year fiasco, Lyla came and stayed with him on the weekends. It was a bit underhanded, but they had the paperwork forged so she was able to go freely. While it’d been going on for a month, nothing had _really_ happened since New Years either. They slept together but that was it…  
  
He frowned when his cell phone rang, still a foreign feeling. Heck, he left it on the counter all day while he was at work. He retrieved it and pressed the little phone, “Hello?”  
  
“Yo, nii-san, you talk to Lyla?”  
  
Shin raised a brow as she quietly washed the dishes. Nope, but he suspected Yagami Koji knew something about why she was now giving him the silent treatment. Going to his bedroom to change, he drawled, “No, she’s not talking to me right now. Did I do something?”  
  
“The hell I know. She was super excited about Valentine’s Day though and wanting to spend it with you tomorrow.”  
  
…Damn it. “Ugh, well, that answers _that_. I said I might have to work tomorrow…”  
  
“Well, that’s understandable too” Koji said, somewhat of a pragmatist.  
  
Lyla used to bake cookies for the occasion when they were kids, after he made her snacks for the first time and the idea elated her. It stopped for a year when they were about eleven but then she picked up and made chocolates for him instead ever since. Flustering, he rubbed his forehead. Huh…he guessed…Lyla had always kind of been his girl.  
  
“…No, I’ll…I’ll definitely make sure not to get called in tomorrow.”  
  
“Are you going to commit?”  
  
Commit. Shin tugged off his shirt before replacing the phone against his ear, absently unbuttoning his pants. Commit.  
  
On New Years, when he went to dinner with the family, it was Shaun that declared he was ‘happy’ Lyla was his girlfriend now. Thankfully _both_ of them corrected him on it but…  
  
He was forced to acknowledge a few things about them. One thing was that he wanted to have sex with her more than he was comfortable with. While they _hadn’t_ since New Years, it didn’t mean he didn’t find himself in precarious positions of lustfully making out with her or _almost_ doing it. She’d gone down on him a few times too.   
  
Naturally, it wasn’t simply sexual. She’d call him to ask how his day was and ask if he was eating. And vice versa, he worried about her frequently being all out there by herself. That was where he was getting…confused. That’s what friends did, they did think of each other’s well-being.  
  
 _However_ , Koji, the ALL-KNOWING, reasoned that, yes, that’s what friends did _but_ they’d…had an intimate relationship in how comfortable they were with one another already. He could tell her things, she could tell him things. They could be natural around each other, they could be themselves to the fullest. There was no…superficial to get comfortable around one another, it was already there. _“What complicated it was the sex._ ”  
  
Yes. Yes, _that_. Taking a relationship that was already deeply emotional and personal and throwing sex into the mix made it very much look like romance. And…  
  
Returning to the living room after finishing his call with Koji, he found Lyla sitting on the couch, eating chips. And…he wasn’t sure how to romance Lyla. Yea, they might be screwing around when it suited both of them but he…wanted to treat her like normal? At least _somewhat_ , he didn’t want to start…having to be different with her.  
  
Shin sat on the couch and picked his food back up, continuing to eat. But then, maybe…maybe he didn’t need to be. “Lai, there’s a restaurant I’d like to take you to. I heard it has really good dessert.”  
  
Lyla frowned, looking to him. “Well, I’d like that, but--”  
  
Kissing her temple, Shin curled into her side sleepily. Lyla sighed, rolling up the chips and hugging his waist. He…he guessed…  
  
After watching a bit of television, Shin went to lie down, exhausted. Lyla smiled and said she’d be in shortly. Yea, this…  
  
He was very much asleep within minutes even with everything on his mind. There was one _extra_ bit of awkwardness though that he’d encountered in this…whatever _this_ was…  
  
Shin groggily felt the sheets move just a bit. Just enough that he groaned, glancing at the clock. 3 am today, huh? He closed his eyes to go back to sleep, it was just…  
  
Swallowing, he heard those light little gasps beside him. It wasn’t anything he was comfortable _asking_ about but once he just kind of pretended to bump into her to clarify what _exactly_ was going on and she didn’t stop. No, she…kept going and he checked to see. She…was asleep and…  
  
He grimaced as he got excited as well. No, no, she was _unconsciously_ masturbating. It was fine, she…she had needs. Just go back to sleep.   
  
It…was just…he bit his lip, trembling, when he could _hear_ her fingers sinking into her sex. That. That was what got him when she got involuntarily…hands-on, just…hearing how wet she was…  
  
Grasping his length in his hand, he jerked off, hard as a rock. The first time it happened, he was just very confused but this was like the eighth time and now…  
  
…Aw, hell, fuck it. Shin rolled over, whispering into her ear, “Lai…?”  
  
Like he figured, she was very asleep but maybe… “Lai?”  
  
She sighed sleepily before shifting around, murmuring, “Shin…?”  
  
“Can…Can I…have you?”  
  
Lyla looked a little puzzled until he braced on top of her. She blinked at him, probably just generally out of it. “…Sure. If you like.”  
  
“No, I…I want you to like it too.”  
  
“…Huh, guess I was dreaming…” she murmured, “…I want it but make it fast. I’m sleepy.”  
  
Smirking at her demand, he hiked down his shorts and slipped his cock inside of her. She breathed out as he rolled his hips, her legs very loosely wrapped around his torso. Honestly, he was pretty half-asleep too, just damn, she was so wet…  
  
“Mmph, mm…Shin” Lyla rasped, hugging his neck, “Harder.”  
  
“Harder?”  
  
“Y-Yes.”  
  
She moaned when he sped up his strokes, pushing more in. Yea, this…  
  
Lyla whimpered, her ankles tapping against his back as she came, groaning out his name. He stroked her hair as he pulled out, wrapping his hand around his shaft to finish. With a pout, Lyla grasped it as well, “Why didn’t you just finish inside?”  
  
“Because you didn’t insert a sponge and I’m not wearing a condom. I care too much about you to get you just spontaneously pregnant when I’m about to go to a warzone, Lai…”  
  
Suddenly, she looked…terrified. “…Shin, you just…you just have to come back okay. You got a good fortune, right?”  
  
Fortune? He scoffed, groaning as he got out of bed to retrieve a towel. “Lyla, a fortune is not going to determine if I survive overseas.”  
  
“No, but…”  
  
When he returned, she was sitting up on her haunches, looking…serious. “…I love you, Shin. And it may be superstition to _you_ , but you’re walking into a dangerous circumstance. It could be hoopla but it’s also not the sort of energy you should have around you.”  
  
Shin groaned as he stretched back into bed, pulling the covers to his neck. “Lai, I just don’t like stuff like that, okay? My bad luck of the draw getting that fortune is not burying me.”  
  
“Shin, if you buy an apple that you cut in to and it’s rotten on the inside, are you keeping it?”  
  
“…Wha?”  
  
“You still _have_ the fortune, don’t you?”  
  
…Well, he just stuffed it in a drawer because he wanted to have a keepsake of their day together! Pouting, flustering at that revelation, he mumbled, “…Yea. You…you got it for me.”  
  
He really expected her to keep berating him but surprisingly she smiled, snuggling into his side, “Baka.”  
  
“Hey.”  
  
Kissing his jaw, she rested her cheek on his chest, “I’ll get you a charm to ward it away.”  
  
“Whatever makes you feel better” he droned, closing his eyes.  
  
…Meh. “Um, L-Lyla, I…I wanted to ask if…”  
  
“Hmm?”  
  
“…W-Well, this…this has been going on for a while now” he stammered, “S-So, maybe you’ll…you’ll let me be your…your boyfriend.”  
  
Lyla fell silent and he expected she fell asleep. Oh well. Alas, she murmured, “…I would really like that, Shin, just…I don’t believe we’ll get that option.”  
  
…What?  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _He often chuckled about it now in his head because he spent…years berating his brothers over the level of their drinking. And no, he never TOUCHED some of the debauchery Koji and Nelly got into drunk. Well…grazed. He grazed the debauchery. But there was definitely a reason he nursed a beer or a mixed drink now: he was out of control drunk.  
  
That particular day worthy of mention, he was off for two days straight. Not great for his bills but much needed because he was worn slam out. He’d say around…noon, he got a call from Aden Bjerk. “Hey, man! I’m in town for a few, come get some drinks with me!”  
  
At…one or two in the afternoon. Day drinking. Lyla had come to visit but HAD to go speak with her father. There were some logistic issues in his head because he would imagine they expected her to head right back to school afterward. She assured she could get one of her nannies to drop her off in town on the premise she had to handle some shopping before she went back and advise that he would take her the rest of the way. Okay…well, he concluded that sure, day drinking!  
  
There were around, oh, a thousand places where this could have gone wrong. Aden, himself, and a couple of their other army colleagues that were around started taking shots of Smirnoff and then were drinking Heineken. He ended up drinking, well, around four bottles of the stuff with three shots of Smirnoff. Luckily, just very, very luckily, after the last incident where his brother very responsibly took his keys, Shin knew not to drive so after seeing Aden back to his hotel, he…managed to get a taxi somehow. God only knows what he said to that poor driver. When Shin got back to his apartment, he collapsed on the couch and popped in porn because, well, apparently being drunk and horny was his strongest compilation.  
  
But just, poor, poor Lyla…he gave her keys so she could come and go as she pleased to his place. He hadn’t even gotten started yet but the surprising owner of his affection just walked right in while girl-on-girl…material started on his television. Again, AGAIN, sane Shin would have been like, ‘why, how embarrassing!’ and turned it off. Nope, not drunk ass Shin. He just stared at her in that dowdy green dress she had to wear in her father’s presence and thought about how much it needed to be off of her.  
  
Lyla gave him a look before glancing at the screen, drawling, “…Do you have some thing for it just being women?”  
  
“Koji, Nelly, and I figured—y’know, even if it’s faked or a career—that a woman is probably going to be more gentle and give a better general idea of what THEY would want when they’re going down on another woman. Men don’t give a shit so…this feels a bit more educational?”  
  
“Uh huh. Educational” she snorted.  
  
Drunk Shin watched as she went to his bedroom. She seemed cross. Drunk Shin could fix that! After some moments, she came back out wearing a leisure dress that came to her knees. Perfect. She sat down on the couch beside him, her arms crossed. “…Can’t you watch something else?”  
  
“Watch with me…”  
  
Lyla blinked languidly at the adult entertainment while he inched a bit closer to her. She cut her eyes at him as he kissed her jaw, stroking her thigh. “Shin, are you drunk again? It’s barely five o’clock.”  
  
“Nah, I’m just a little frustrated, is all…”  
  
Lies. Lyla swallowed as he kissed her neck hard. “Shin, you can’t give me hickeys…”  
  
“Oh yea. There are better places to kiss” he whispered.  
  
She looked a little perturbed as whatever was happening on the screen intensified, the bottled cries of the participants getting louder. Lyla flustered, pouting, “J-Just turn this off, Shin.”  
  
DRUNK AS HELL Shin smiled, lifting her dress up to review she had those cute pink lacy panties on. Touching the material, he teased, “Why? You getting turned on, Lai?”  
  
“N-No. I-It’s just weird to watch other people have sex.”  
  
Oh so naturally, he pushed the undergarments aside and ran the upper portion of his finger down her sex. “Oh really? Looks like you’re getting wet to me…”  
  
“I-I’m not” she protested, her face hot.  
  
“Go on, baby” he drawled, pushing her legs apart, “Touch your pussy. Show me you can take care of yourself.”  
  
Yep. Drunk AS HELL. Honestly though, the worst part was Lyla not ONCE in these occurrences told him to ‘go to Hell’. His best friend rested the soles of her feet on the couch, rubbing the flesh gently and making the most timid chirp sounds. Shin grabbed her hand after some minutes of this, pushing one of the digits into his mouth. “That’s so gross, Shin.”  
  
“Oh yea? You weren’t complaining last time” he heckled before touching her again, “…Or do I have to remind you, huh? You must have forgotten.”  
  
“Shin--”  
  
He probably was lucky he didn’t collapse on the ground when he kneeled between her legs, spreading them further apart. “W-Watch the porn while I eat you out, Lyla.”  
  
“Shin, you are SO drunk again.”  
  
Boy, and how. However, even…sober, he would admit this was probably one of his fantasies. She bit her lip as he teasingly ran his tongue down her fleshy folds. Whispering, he kissed her inner thigh, “W-Watch them fuck while I eat your pussy.”  
  
Yep, he was always deeply ashamed how much of a dominant asshole he got to be wasted. Didn’t even ASK half the time. Lyla assured, at a later time, that he always told her what she wanted to hear anyway. Man, just…  
  
Lyla whimpered as he sucked her clit, drawing the pink nub into his mouth and rolling his tongue around it. Curling his mouth entirely around what he could of her sex, he pulled hard, his cheeks puckering. He smiled, pulling away to spread her ‘lips’. “Mm, look at that juicy fucking pussy…you still grossed out?”  
  
She shook her head almost bashfully. Fuck. He spread her legs more, his eyes closing some, before he dove back in. Lyla moaned, her hands running through his hair, “S-Shin, pl-lease.”  
  
“What are they doing, Lai?” he growled.  
  
“W-What?”  
  
“What are they doing on the screen?”  
  
“S-She’s-she’s doing the s-same thing you are” she trembled.  
  
“Is she as wet as you are right now?”  
  
“I-I don’t-I don’t think so!” she whined as he suckled her clit hard.  
  
She was moaning and playing with her tits as he pulled her to grind hard against his mouth and tongue, pushing his fingers inside of her. “Shin! Shin!”  
  
He pulled away as she convulsed, her thighs squeezing together tight as she sobbed in ecstasy, clutching her nipples. Oh, he was ready to be mean today…  
  
“N-N—Wait, Shin!” she protested as he gave her ZERO recovery time, driving his tongue inside of her sex.   
  
Her hips were bucking as he thumbed her clit this time, flicking back the hood to tease the sensitive skin. She closed her legs, her flesh shivering as she choked, “S-Stop, stop, I’m--”  
  
Shin chuckled as she clenched his couch, her heels grinding into the chair, “You just taste so good, Lyla…I’m going to lick your pussy all night.”  
  
“N-No” she whined petulantly.  
  
“Hmm? Oh, maybe you want me to finger fuck it instead then?”  
  
He could feel her heart racing against his arm as he thrust his middle and pointer finger inside of her. Mm, yes, that. She liked that. A stifled high pitched moan escaped her throat as he stroked the mysterious ‘g-spot’, a falsetto ‘fuck’ skipping off her lips. He loved that, drunk or sober…   
  
“I-I need it, Shin. I want it” she suddenly pleaded.  
  
Tilting his head, he raised a brow, “What?”  
  
“Please, please, don’t make me say it.”  
  
Honestly, he’d like to say he was playing dumb in those moments but he was kind of drawing a blank, she’d already come three times now. What did she need and want? Listening to his fingers sink deeper and deeper into her soaking wet flesh, he blinked, “I…don’t know what you want?”  
  
“B-Baka!”  
  
His turn to pout, he turned her over on her knees, continuing to finger her hard with one hand and stroke her throbbing clit with the other. “Tell me.”  
  
Lyla’s eyes were closed, cheek down into the couch as the sultriest little croons escaped her gaping mouth. “Shin, please…please…I-I want your…I want your dick.”  
  
“…Oh!”  
  
Drunk and dumb as hell. Whipping it out, he reclined on the couch and grinned, “You want this cock, ride it.”  
  
“E-Eh? R-Ride it?”  
  
“Ride it. Get on top, Lai.”  
  
It hadn’t really sunk in but last drunk rendezvous, she was on top. It wasn’t really quite as easy as him being on top, parts and gravity were working against them. Alas, Okamoto Lyla was the quickest learner in some aspects and she rode him like a damn pro almost instantly. He pretty much sobered up immediately because not once did he slip out or did it go other places. It stayed very much in position as she twerked her ass and pussy up and down on his shaft. “F-Fuck, Lyla.”  
  
“Mm, Shin, it feels so good” she rasped.  
  
He was a little startled when she was able to lean over and kiss his neck while maintaining a very…generous speed, his eyes widening. Woah now. He was all for a tide turning but damn. Shin’s eyes rolled back, gnawing his lip. She was so damn wet.  
  
Why was this…particular day worth mention though? This particular event? Well, that day, when he was drunk ass Shin, he rather carelessly ejaculated inside of her at least twice. This was without not one lick of protection or even the heinously questionable backup action of him pulling out. Nope, he…was drunk ass Shin, the dumbass.  
  
Funny how just one day of day drinking could set off that sort of chain._

_  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
_

Yagami Shin hummed as he lifted some boxes and set them on a shelf in the grocery store where he worked, adjusting some nearby containers of rice that had been knocked off kilter. Nodding when they were straightened, knowing deep down it was a waste of time, he went back to the front to see if he needed to do anything before he got off.  
  
A customer was standing in the front with the manager, a middle-aged somewhat worn looking guy. It was slow so it looked like they were just chatting it up until Shin approached. As Shin got closer, he noted the man’s brows furrowed sharply. Oh no.  
  
“Takamori-san, I finished stock and cleanup. Did you want me to do any deliveries?” Shin questioned.  
  
“Ah, no, we’re all wrapped up with that, Yagami, you can head on out.”  
  
Shin bowed, about to take his leave, when the stranger suddenly drawled, “‘Yagami’? Yagami Yamada’s son?”  
  
Shin nodded. In Wasaba, his dad was…something of a legend. Depending on the age group, that status apparently came from different means but he’d met a lot of people that seemed surprised he was here. Yes, he grasped that his dad did…everything to get out of here but this was just a brief fork in the road. He had no intention of staying here either.

This guy looked…unimpressed. Fine? They had nothing to prove. “You’re all a real piece of work. Your dad takes off and thinks he’s too good for us, knocking up that rich slut and shacking up in the hills so his kids can come back here and take jobs from people that actually need it.”  
  
“Yea, that ‘rich slut’ is my mom, so, you’ll excuse me while I’m still trying to let that part slide.” Koji would have already given him a concussion by now.  
  
Takamori-san glared, “Mick, stop that. Just like Yamada, Shin is a very hard worker. Not once has he not pulled his weight around here and I would say Yamada both got his kids out of here _and_ kept them on the straight and arrow. And that aside, I hire anyone that comes in wanting to work. I’m not picking favorites.”  
  
‘Mick’, Shin supposed, snorted, “Should have figured you’d pull the same exact shit, Ose. Kiss that bastard’s ass too.”  
  
Ose looked nonplussed, counting off on his fingers. “Ole got out. Kari got out. Mina got out. Mariko got out. Bara got out. Chouko got out—Ayame, Sengoku, Kira—people _got out_. And even the people from that time period that stayed have really turned Wasaba around. What’s your point?”  
  
“All I’m saying is your free ride to being a millionaire shouldn’t be blowing out some rich slut’s cunt and knocking her up.”  
  
How much did he _actually_ need this job? Shin stared, doing the calculations in his head. After a bit of balancing in a few seconds, he punched the bastard square in the jaw.  
  
Mick yelped as he was thrown back into the wall. Shin was prepared for at least a _couple_ more swings but Takamori quickly came to hold him back. “Hold on, son!”  
  
 _Why_? Mick looked…flabbergasted for some reason, like he wasn’t just calling his mom _entirely out of her name_ and pretty much claiming his dad got a ‘free ride’. NONE OF THEM got a free ride, they paid by forfeiting _peace_! While he gnashed on his teeth, Ose gave Mick a dry look, “You _dumbass_. This is _Reikoku’s_ son or is _all_ your sense of history fucked? If I were you, I’d leave and think over some things because I hear _Reikoku’s other son_ is a _monster_ and would have you in the ER right now. Keep thinking they got over to a mansion and got cozy.”  
  
What? Mick quickly left without another word and Shin glared down at the broken flesh on his knuckles. Damn. “I…I apologize, Takamori-san. That was very unprofessional of me.”  
  
“Yagami, some random asshole rolls up in here and calls my mom a cunt and a slut, they’re losing teeth” Ose scoffed, patting his shoulder, “Punch the clock and head on out, you did good today. I’ll see you tomorrow.”  
  
…Fwoo. “Thank you, Takamori-san.” _  
  
_Despite that, Shin _hoped_ Mick still had some ‘problems’ and was outside waiting. Nope, not sight or sound of him. Damn it.  
  
…Ugh. Shin patted his pockets and found his keys, going to the car his dad bought him and making the drive to Subami. That…ignorant bastard.  
  
He opened the door to the Yagami home and looked around. It was only about two o’clock so the chances of anyone being home was slim. Stopping and standing in the entry for a moment, he stared around. ‘Free ride’. How…how…  
  
 _Enraging._ Stomping into the living room, he was honestly relieved to find his dad there. The man was on one of the stretched out reclining parts, curled under a blanket and fast asleep. Shin wandered over and sat beside him, resting his head back and gazing into space for a little while. Damn.  
  
Yagami Yamada made some muffled sleepy sound, turning over on his side so he was facing Shin. After a few more minutes, his blue eyes opened groggily. When he talked to Jill last night, she informed him their dad had been working a 48 hour shift after having worked a 36 hour one with only a five hour break in between. How…how dare that ignorant bastard…?  
  
Surprisingly, probably because he was out of it, the man smiled some, “Oh, hey, son. What are you doing here?”  
  
“…Just…checking on you, dad.”  
  
“Checking on me?” Yamada echoed, yawning, “Mm…I don’t even remember falling asleep. I’m fine though. How are you doing?”  
  
Shin patted his knee, slowly shaking his head, “…Not so great. Do…do you remember knowing a guy named Mick in Wasaba?”  
  
His dad sat up completely, his eyes bleary as he nodded, “…Yea, yea, Mick. I remember him. Why?”  
  
“…Well, don’t…don’t be fooled if you come to Wasaba and he comes off nice to you. He doesn’t mean it” he said lowly.  
  
“Oh?”  
  
“He…he said you only got where you are by…by getting mom pregnant with me. It’s not true and…and I punched him.”  
  
Yamada groaned, “Son. I appreciate you being defensive over me but I literally have _nothing_ to prove to that guy. I barely remember what he looks like.”  
  
“…He also addressed mom as a slut and a cunt so that actually…had more to do with the punch, sorry.”  
  
“…So only one punch, huh?”  
  
Shin quirked his eyebrows, shaking his head, “Yea, I wasn’t particularly proud of that. One of those times I really wish Koji had been there.”  
  
Snorting, Yamada rubbed his face, “If _Koji_ were there, I’d have to be hiring a homicide lawyer right now so I thank the universe for that. Ha. ‘Mick the Prick’, that’s right. That’s what Shin used to call him.”  
  
It was so hard imagining his dad young and having weirdly juvenile nicknames like that for people. Yamada looked a bit confused, “What even made him say anything like that to you though?”  
  
“…Said you left Wasaba to become a ‘cushy’ doctor that got out of the slums via impregnating mom and never looked back. Meanwhile, here’s your kid there taking a job from someone that actually needs it. I…I can’t stand that. I just can’t.”  
  
Yamada shrugged. “Honestly son, I’m more aggravated over what he said about your mom than me. To some degree, he’s right: after I found out about you, I was determined to work even harder for a good life for you on top of everything else.”  
  
…Shit. “I-I never want you to think I don’t respect everything you’ve done for me, dad. Like-Like, I don’t want you to think that I don’t appreciate what our lives would’ve looked like if it weren’t for all your sacrifices. I-I am eternally grateful. I-It’s just…I look at it like I…I have to strike out and do this for people that…that didn’t have a mom willing to crawl through the mud for them or a dad that suffered tremendously to make life better.”  
  
Yamada frowned, slowly tapping his fingers together. Maybe…it was stupid. “…I understand, Shin.”  
  
Uh huh. “You sure?”  
  
“You’re my son, Shin. The same goes for your brothers and your sister, I…I would rather see all of you safe than doing something that may prematurely take you away from me. But that’s…life and I have to come to terms with the fact that my baby…has made decisions for himself. While they’re not decisions with foreseeable outcomes, again, that is also life. And seeing what you’re becoming, I am proud of what I’m watching unfound.”  
  
Shin swallowed, dropping his head, “…Thanks, dad.”  
  
“Can I make a request, however?”  
  
Oh boy. “…Sure.”  
  
“If you’re to be deployed in August, can I request that you return to _this home_ for July until you’re shipped off?”  
  
Eyes widening, Shin looked at his father who appeared serious enough. Oh. “O-Oh, well, of course, dad. That was my plan anyway.”  
  
“You _could_ return now.”  
  
With a laugh, Shin stretched his shoulders, “I _could_. It’d be nice to take long hot showers again…just, y’know, it’s gotten a bit…peaceful being on my own right now.”  
  
Yamada snickered, grabbing his blanket, “Well, definitely can’t fault you there with your five rowdy siblings. And I’m sure seeing Lyla would be trickier given we live right next to her warden.”  
  
Yea… Shin jumped when his cell phone buzzed in his pocket. Woah. “Ah, one sec, dad.”  
  
Removing it from his pants and finding it was Lyla, he started to let her leave a message. Just…2:30 on a Wednesday was odd. Picking up, he murmured, “Hey, Lai. What’s going on?”  
  
“…Shin. U-Um, I…”  
  
He frowned as she fell silent. What? “Lyla?”  
  
“If…or when you’re not too busy, can…can you come see me? I-I don’t know what to do.”  
  
“…Okay. I’ll call you in a few.”  
  
Very confused about that phone call, he stared at the silver device before glancing back at his dad. The man was naturally falling back to sleep, probably still exhausted. “I’m so sorry for waking you, dad. Just…needed to vent a little and apologize if I was coming off as ignorant as that guy.”  
  
“Not at all, son” grunted Yamada, patting his shoulder, “…I want to say I’m sorry if, during this time, I came off like someone you couldn’t talk to. I… I know the importance of coming into your own.”  
  
Shin smiled, “Well, I can’t blame you too much, dad. You already have two wild daredevil sons.”  
  
“Don’t remind me” he groaned.  
  
With a laugh, he stood, “I’ll come have dinner with everyone tomorrow. Lyla seems to need my presence right now.”  
  
“Sounds good. Good talking with you, Shin.”  
  
“You too, dad.”  
  
Heading for the exit, he paused. There was a weird portion of that incident with Mick, beside the decades of resentment. “…Hey, dad.”  
  
“Mm?”  
  
“…Ose, my boss, he said something about ‘Reikoku’. ‘Ruthless’. Sounded like he was regarding it to you though. Why?”  
  
“Got me” Yamada murmured, his eyes closed, “Wasaba was a funny place…”  
  
Huh. Maybe. Shin got back into his car and started the drive toward Lyla’s school, listening to Live. _I can feel it coming back again, like a rolling thunder chasing the wind…_

Pulling off to the side where he usually did, he called Lyla. “Hey, I’m at our usual.”  
  
“…Okay.”  
  
Man, what was going on? She sounded so out of it. Shin frowned, looking toward the building she usually emerged from, finding her wearing a light jacket in the warming weather. He tilted his head as she got into the passenger’s seat silently, murmuring a light ‘hey’. Oh no. “Lai, what’s the matter?”  
  
“…Can we drive somewhere? I’m-I’m not supposed to be out of the dorm right now because I wasn’t feeling well but…”  
  
Eh? “Sure…”  
  
He awkwardly fiddled with the radio, almost feeling like music wasn’t quite appropriate right now, but Lyla wasn’t making a sound. What…what was going on? Moving his car toward a park about ten minutes away, he smiled quickly, “U-Uh, so—what feels bad? You said you’re not feeling well.”

“…I don’t know what to do.”  
  
“About what? I’m here.”  
  
 _My friend and me, looking through her red box of memories. Faded, I’m sure, but love seems to stick in her veins, you know? Yes, there’s love if you want it; don’t sound like no sonnet, my lord. Yes, there’s love if you want it; don’t sound like no sonnet, my lord…  
_  
Shin pulled his car into the parking lot of the park, turning off the vehicle to turn and give her the entirety of his attention. “What’s wrong, Lyla?

He supposed he should have come to appreciate the coincidental moments. Life wasn’t a movie but there was always some sort of soundtrack to his life. Lyla stared at him solemnly with her green eyes, the vessels just…lost. What?

_Why can’t you see that nature has its way of warning me? Eyes open wide, looking at the heavens with a tear in my eye. Yes, there’s love if you want it; don’t sound like no sonnet, my lord. Yes, there’s love if you want it; don’t sound like no sonnet, my lord. My lord.  
  
_ “I’m late. I…I don’t know what to do.”

_Sinking faster than a boat without a hull; My lord. Dreaming about the day when I can see you there; my side…by my side._  
  
…Late. Late… “…Lai, are you saying…?”  
  
“I…I haven’t taken a test yet. I could never take it at school” she whispered, scrunching her skirt.  
  
 _Shit_. Shin’s head started to…rush, the blood pounding in his head as he tried to come to terms with the fact he might have impregnated his best friend.   
  
Shit! Slamming his head back against the headrest, he slowly shook his head. His mom _literally_ voiced her valid concern this would happen and he _swore_ it was okay—damn it!  
  
Lyla frowned, “What’s wrong?”

_Here we go again and my head is gone, my lord. I stop to say ‘hello’ ‘cause I think you should know by now…by now. By now. By now. By now. By now. Oh, by now…_  
  
“What’s wrong?” he echoed, aghast, “You might be pregnant with my child! I-I’m about to _leave_ , Lyla! If—I mean, depending on what you _want_ , I’d-I’d miss the birth of my child and-and—shit!”  
  
This would be what he expected from his _brothers_. Burying his face in his hands, he took a deep breath. Okay. Okay. He turned to Lyla and reached out to grip her hand. “It’s-It’s my fault, Lai. I-I was irresponsible. I should have been more careful with you. I know I needed to be more careful with you. I’m so sorry.”  
  
“Shin…”  
  


“So, let’s…let’s get married.”  
  
Her eyes widened as he calculated, “If we get married, should-should anything ever happen to me in the line of duty, you’ll receive all the benefits of having been my wife. Also, the monthly stipend I’d get, I’d-I’d just give to you. I’d probably need a small percentage but I’d give the majority to you then save a bit. Once I get back, I’ll start working to get us a house and stuff. Until then—while I’m on duty, I’ll convince my parents to put up for an apartment near where Koji or Nelly go to school so they can watch out for you. It’s-it’s not the best plan but I want you to be safe and as stress free as possible.”  
  
“…Shin.”  
  
He frowned, looking up at her. She looked…very dour. What? “…If I’m pregnant, I can’t keep the baby.”  
  
…Oh.  
  
“…O-Oh yea, ri-right. Right!” he blurted, quickly shaking his head, “T-That’s your right and everything, Lai, I-I’m sorry I forgot. I-I just went right into making plans wi-without discussing your interpretation. Th-That’s fine.”  
  
…Right. They sat in dead silence for at least two minutes as his…body felt cold. What? It…it was perfectly reasonable. They were really young so to…to have a baby right now, irrespective, would be ridiculous. He swallowed hard, looking out the window to where a kid was playing in the park. Yea. Ridiculous.  
  
“Shin.”  
  
He didn’t turn to look at her, didn’t respond. He…was fine. She continued, “…In what you came up with, would you only marry me because of the baby?”  
  
Shit. Quickly looking back, a little alarmed that his plot may have sounded like that, he rapidly shook his head, “N-No, Lyla, I-I’m sorry. Maybe it-it did sound like that, but I’d…I’d marry you because I love you. And I’d-I’d like the idea of you being my wife.”  
  
“You’ve never asked before…”  
  
“Well, n-no. Under normal circumstances, I’d want to see how we played out as a couple or…slight couple first before I asked. Just, with a baby involved, I…I guess the scenario changes. I wouldn’t want you to suffer alone like…like my dad did. I’d consider how to make life just ever so slightly easier for you, if I possibly could.”  
  
She looked at her lap before looking up, staring out of the windshield, “…It’s a nice thought.”  
  
…Right. “Don’t…don’t worry about it, Lai. You…you do what’s right for you. Here, I’ll…I’ll drive you to get a pregnancy test, you can take it in the store, and…and I won’t even ask the results.”  
  
“…Okay.”  
  
Now requiring quiet, he turned the radio off and drove to the pharmacy up the street. Lyla didn’t say anything as she got out of the car and went inside. Staring through the window, Shin felt his heart race. It…it didn’t matter. It wouldn’t matter either way. She…she had made her decision.  
  
After twenty minutes, when she returned with her face flushed and eyes glossy, he trembled. So…so be it.

He guessed…he wouldn’t be following in his father’s footsteps at all.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _“…Koji.”  
  
Yagami Koji was steaming some milk in the little coffee shop where he worked part-time when Shin wandered in. He needed something far stronger than coffee but that damn alcohol was what led him to this in the first place. His younger brother looked up, raising a brow, “Yo. What brings you in?”  
  
“…Just needed an ear and voice of reason.”  
  
It was quiet, a weekday, and apparently only a handful of people needed a warm beverage on this cold day. Shin seated himself at the counter as Koji poured the milk into a red mug, stirring in espresso and drizzling some sort of sauce on top. “Hold on, be right back.”  
  
“Okay.”  
  
He rested his elbows on the table, blowing into his hands. Lyla didn’t say a word to him the remainder of the trip back to her school. To be honest, he didn’t want her to and was genuinely relieved. He’d made…a grave error.  
  
“So what’s going on, oldest?”  
  
Shin looked up absently as Koji reappeared, crossing his arms and leaning against the black counter behind him. For a moment, Shin tried to create some advanced narrative so this didn’t sound like it had anything to do with him. Problem was, Koji wasn’t stupid.  
  
“…I’m only telling you, Koji. Do NOT let this get to anyone else. Swear to me.”  
  
“Literally WHY do you always bring ME into this?” Koji actually groaned, “Last time it was the army and it was the cops…”_

_“Guess I trust you not to tell” Shin groaned as well.  
  
Koji shrugged, “Well, true, I’m not a snitch. All right, whatcha got?”  
  
“So, I went to visit dad today. In the midst of this visit, Lyla calls me, tells me she needs to see me” Shin explained, drumming his fingertips against the cool linoleum surface, “I went to her, she told me…she told me she was late.”  
  
“…LATE?”  
  
Shin nodded grimly. Koji gawked, “…Shin, please tell me you weren’t hitting Lyla raw, man.”  
  
“…It was two, three incidents of me not using protection.”  
  
Koji squeezed the bridge of his nose, “…I’m not crazy about protection myself, Shin. I’m an idiot and will jump on the chance of a chick telling me to just pull out but you KNOW better with Lyla.”  
  
“Look, I was WASTED when those times happened and I SWEAR I will not drink the same way again in my entire life. It’s not the problem anyway, Koji, I…I told her I wanted to marry her.”  
  
Holding up his hands, Koji slowly grabbed a stool and sat down. “Dude.”  
  
“If she married me, she would get all my military benefits and I could send her the check the army would be giving me. It was…practical purposes but I gave her a run down of the plan. She told me, ‘if I’m pregnant, I can’t keep it’.”  
  
Koji’s eyes widened as Shin felt like he was carrying lead in his stomach. Why? It… “I…I took her to get the test because I told her I would. I also told her since it was her choice, I didn’t even need to know the results. So she took it in the store, came out in tears, and I-I didn’t even ask.”  
  
“Didn’t—dude! Why?!” Koji demanded, incredulous._

_“Because…it’s the woman’s choice. And I didn’t want to make it seem like it affected anything between us. Except…except on the ride back home to my apartment where I sat in the dark up until now, I-I found myself asking those stupid…MASCULINE questions of myself.”  
  
“Masculine questions?” Koji echoed.  
  
Shin shrugged awkwardly, “A hundred percent, it is Lyla’s body. It is her body, it is her womb, it’s her…life. She should have a hundred percent control. I agree that’s how it should be and, in the hopefully NEVER situation it happened to our baby sister, I want her to know it’s her right to do what she sees fit with her body.”  
  
“Right…”  
  
“But…I’d be a damn liar if I didn’t think at some point tonight ‘but…half of that baby is mine. Half of it. It wouldn’t have been possible without us both so…do I really not get a say in this at all?’.”  
  
With a frown, Koji glanced up as if in thought. “…Until we get to a point where you can take the baby of an unwilling pregnant woman through transferal or…I dunno, Star Trek transporter, no. Yes, it IS half yours and yes, were this a woman that wanted the child, you also would be expected to take ownership and responsibility even if you don’t want it. It’s not a very forgiving system but, end of the day, we’re not carrying the baby. It’s not our call.”  
  
“…Yes. I know. I know, I just…” Shin whispered.  
  
“…You…you think she’s pregnant?”  
  
“…Yea.”  
  
“…Damn. Sorry, Shin.”  
  
…Yea…he was too.  
  
_Koji came back with him that night, said he could ‘monitor him’ if he had a drink which was a pretty laughable irony considering the circumstances. Alas, they sat back in amiable silence and nursed a bottle of vodka together. For whatever reason, Koji suggested that maybe he should just come home for a little while to recover. Shin remembered long nights of sitting in silence and…yea, he didn’t need that. Then. Now.

  
He wished he could tell his dad or his mom. Tell them he also had gotten someone pregnant and was willing to take responsibility. They would have been pissed but he knew they’d be great grandparents. Instead, now? He just had to wonder what it was he had with Lyla. He…he now wondered what _he_ was to Lyla.   
  
Shin tugged on his dress coat, wandering down the steps. He’d asked. He’d asked to be her boyfriend, she essentially said ‘no’. He asked to be her husband so that she and their child could be taken care of. She said ‘no’ and she was aborting their baby. He…he very much understood autonomy, consent, that…whole yard. Just right now it was starting to look like he was just really a fling for her and nothing more. They had sex and they went out together. That…that was it. No titles, no commitments.   
  
…Having had a father that worked himself to the bone to get his wife back from a crazy, dangerous situation and, in turn, a mother that worked just as hard to keep her husband as safe as she could, that…that just wasn’t good enough for him.  
  
“’Ey, everyone ready? Mom and dad said they’re gonna meet us there” Koji called, coming down the steps behind Shin.  
  
His brother rolled his eyes when Jill called to say she was putting on ‘lip gloss’ and Tony was gelling his hair. “I keep forgetting they’re teenagers now. We’re going to eat at a damn French restaurant, they’re not going to see anyone. Kill me.”  
  
“You are a teenager” Shin droned.  
  
“For one more month” Koji grinned lazily.  
  
Shin sighed, “Adulthood isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. I’ve enjoyed this break back into not having a single thing to do.”  
  
He asked for a few days off from the grocery store, using the incident as an excuse. Ose assured that he could come back when he was ready. He guessed _that_ was a blessing but still…  
  
With a shrug, Koji leaned against the mahogany table in the foyer. “Guess I still have a while of winging it. Granted, I’ll be in college and needing to keep myself on track but I don’t plan on doing any more work than I’m already doing.”  
  
Crossing his arms, Shin frowned, “Are you _sure_ you want to go to Saitama? That’s miles from here and Nelly was really hoping you’d reconsider going to Yokohama.”  
  
“I’m sure” Koji stretched, “Like I told you, a little healthy separation. And it’s like an hour and a half from here. I’ll be _way_ closer than you’ll be.”  
  
That was for sure. Shin rubbed his brow, shaking his head, “…Let’s just hope everything works out.”  
  
Shaun, the family baby, rushed down the steps, all smiles. “I’m gonna eat the snail tonight.”  
  
“Escargot, kid” Koji corrected, adjusting the buttons on his sleeve, “And it is _disgusting_.”  
  
“I just want to say I’ve eaten a snail. Like Gary. You know Gary?”  
  
Koji stared at Shaun for a moment before drawling. “…You’re like our personal testament to why none of us should have children.”  
  
Shin couldn’t help laugh, perhaps because of the weight of that comment on his soul at this moment or the fact that they had raised Shaun just as much as their parents and he was a pretty weird work of art. Shaun just pouted, “I just wanna try.”  
  
“Well, experimenting with food is fine. Don’t let that travel in too many wild directions in life though” Koji assured.  
  
Nodding rapidly, Shaun replied, “I’ll never drink anything but Mike’s Hard Lemonade.”  
  
Shin smiled as Koji squeezed the bridge of his nose. Yea, they really did good.   
  
Nelly appeared, wearing a gray dinner jacket and jangling his keys, “Yo, if our perpetually late ass parents get there before we do, I’m fighting ya’ll! Let’s go!”  
  
Finally, Jill and Tony came down the steps, Jill’s hair adorned with butterfly clips and wearing a blue sundress while Tony’s hair was spiked up. Nelly blinked drolly before sighing, “This is going to be a wild decade.”  
  
“You’re just not cool anymore, ‘nii-san” Tony stuck out his tongue.  
  
“Woest me, I’ve tapped out of ‘cool’ at seventeen!” Nelly flourished, walking toward the door.  
  
“Yea, you’re old!”  
  
“If me being old prevents me from looking like a damn cockatoo, I’ll take it!”  
  
Shaking his head, Shin directed everyone out as they continued to argue. The kids got in the back seat of his car while Nelly and Koji argued over who was being sentenced to ‘backseat’ hell today. Yea, as much as he loved his car, it probably wasn’t suited for this amount of people…  
  
Nelly hummed as they rode up the dark streets in early April. There was still a faint chill in the air but it felt like Spring during the day. Shin swallowed as he pulled up to the French restaurant, the same one where he met Parsley those years ago.   
  
Shaking his head, Shin pulled in to one of the few empty spots, the restaurant apparently packed for the dinner crowd. They all walked into the establishment, instantly quieting down their general ruckus. No one was going to say the Yagami kids were raucous…in public, anyway.   
  
Shin smiled some as he approached the very same hostess that seemed to question his place in this oh so fancy locale as a not quite a hundred percent Japanese person. He wasn’t the praying type but he did pray in his head she was reasonable because Koji’s switch could flip on a dime. “Good Evening. We’re the Yagami party.”  
  
“Ah, yes, this way, please” she nodded, picking up menus and holding her hand out.  
  
…Huh. That was anticlimactic. Shin and his siblings followed her to a round table near the veranda overlooking a pond or lake. When he looked to the left, at the neighboring table about ten feet away, was Okamoto Lyla next to a black haired man with her parents.  
  
He stared for a moment as whomever this mystery fellow was patted her hand and looked at her beseechingly. Oh. Okay.  
  
Shin very purposefully sat so he would not be facing whatever the fuck was going on at that table, his back to all of it as his siblings quietly fashioned themselves around their table to fill the seats so they couldn’t see it either. Koji sat beside him, Nelly taking the next seat to his right, and opened his menu. After a moment, the tumultuous younger drawled, never looking up, “…Want me to go flip a table?”  
  
“No.”  
  
Shaun frowned, “We can change tables, onii-san.”  
  
“…No. We don’t run for anyone.”  
  
“Fucking right” Nelly muttered, glancing once over his shoulder.  
  
Luckily, as it lessened the time they had to be in this place, his mom and dad walked in, the woman holding her father’s arm, the both of them all smiles. Yea…not following his parent’s footsteps at all. “Sorry we’re late, dears.”  
  
Of course, his parents saw immediately, his mother’s brows furrowing as his father just frowned. They slowly took a seat, probably wondering why they hadn’t asked to be moved literally _anywhere_ else in this venue. No. He…he got it.  
  
“Um, anyway, I wanted to celebrate tonight but maybe Italian is more appropriate” his mama laughed quickly.  
  
Yamada frowned, “Well, they’re both appropriate…”  
  
What now? Koji raised a brow, setting his menu down, “What do you mean?”  
  
“I got news that I’m being asked to show at the 2001 Milan and Paris Fashion Week” Dana smiled.   
  
“Oh wow, that’s awesome, mama, congrats!” Nelly nodded.  
  
“Yes, congratulations, mama” Shin smiled…some. She deserved it and he wished they had gone to an Italian restaurant so he could feel happier for her.  
  
Ah, the all pragmatic Koji, he nodded as a waitress came to pour them water. “…Don’t _you_ have to pay to show at Fashion Week though? It’s great they really want to see you there but it’s like inviting someone to party and asking them to pay a hundred thousand gold pieces for attending.”  
  
Dana nodded, “I have a sponsor for, well, admission. I have to fund all the fashion, of course, but they’re paying my way.”  
  
“Oh my God, that’s so cool, mama” Jill gushed, “Can we go to see?”  
  
“Of course, dear!”  
  
…Man. He wasn’t really a fashion person, of course, but that was a big deal. His mom started from scratch, she had very little professional training and Yagada started out of Wasaba, really. To make it to an international level, he…he ought to be able to see that.  
  
Koji sipped his water, blinking at him, “Your first tour is like six months, right? Before you head out for the year stint?”  
  
“Yea?”  
  
“Fashion week is in February so you should be good, right?”  
  
…Oh yea, he was leaving early August so barring nothing happened with him departing on time, he would be back early February. He smiled softly, “I don’t want to miss it, mama.”  
  
“You’ll have a valid excuse if it comes to that, Sweetie Plum” she reassured, patting his hand.  
  
He nodded but it just hit him: he would miss things. He just very narrowly averted missing the twin’s graduation and everyone’s birthday. Almost everyone, he would miss his parent’s birthdays. What…what else would he miss?  
  
…Glancing over his shoulder, he swallowed. What…else?  
  
Everyone else started to get comfortable, Shaun getting to try his snails and agreeing they weren’t quite as tasty nor were they as ‘cute’ as Gary. Koji and Nelly argued a bit over their locations of school some more, Nelly the more apprehensive one about such a distance. He…  
  
He wondered why she was over there, being wooed by some other man right now. Her dad, perhaps. But just…he promised. He _promised_ he’d take care of her. He promised that she would be taken care of. If she didn’t want to be taken care of, he understood that too. He just…didn’t understand what they were then. They shouldn’t be sleeping together. They shouldn’t be having to make pregnancy plans because he impregnated her. Why…why didn’t she want his baby…?  
  
What…was wrong with him?  
  
“Hey, Dana, why don’t you take the SUV?”  
  
Shin looked up, startled, that somewhere in this fog they had walked out of the restaurant, he the only one holding a mostly uneaten to-go box. His father had asked this of their mother, this vehicle transfer. His parents had realized they had an army and purchased the large vehicle. Usually his dad drove it, more comfortable with the behemoth where his mom usually drove cars. She indeed looked a little alarmed. Koji cleared his throat, “I’ll drive.”  
  
Well, good, they wouldn’t have to cram into his car, Shin supposed. Alas, he was once again confused when his dad was left standing there with him. Huh? Yamada shrugged, “Oh, I thought we could ride back together.”  
  
“O-Oh, okay.”  
  
Weird. Shin got in and realized, not since his dad initially taught him to drive, Yamada hadn’t ridden with Shin in the car. Oh man, he hoped he was still driving right, jeez. Yamada got into the passenger seat…and squinted. “…Good lord, this is smaller than I remember. Are you really fitting all your siblings in here?”  
  
“By some miracle, yea” Shin had to smirk.  
  
“Well, I guess eventually they’ll all be driving so it won’t be pressing to get you a bigger one.”  
  
God…the kids _were_ nearing that age. Shaking his head, he started to pull out of the parking lot after assuring the others left first. “Uh, what’s…what’s going on, dad? I mean, I-I’m always glad to spend time with you, just…”  
  
Yamada made a face before sighing deeply, “…Show me your place in Wasaba.”  
  
Oh. Shin stared before drawling, “…I thought you never wanted to go back.”  
  
“I don’t.”  
  
Okay. Going toward the neighborhood where he and his father started to that same apartment building, Shin wasn’t sure what to make of this. Why? He…he had a lot on his mind already right now, what was this about? His dad’s blue eyes closed some as they entered into undeniably Wasaba. Shin grimaced when, just so happened, there was a fight of about five, six teenage boys right on the corner. Any _other_ time, no one was doing that but of course _this once_. “U-Uh, I really have not seen any fights since I moved here, dunno what that is about.”  
  
“Mm.”  
  
Shin internally groaned, parking in his usual spot and walking toward the entrance. He looked back to see where his father was…he was looking at a random plank of concrete on the ground, his hands stuffed in his pockets. There wasn’t much of an expression on his face, just…a void. “Dad?”  
  
“…Sorry. Just thinking” he replied, stepping around the section and following him.  
  
…PTSD. Shin swallowed, fumbling with his keys as they got on the elevator. His dad leaned against the available railing, looking up and around with a raised brow. “…Huh, this definitely got fancier.”  
  
“Yea, I do remember this was a lot more sketchy as a kid…”  
  
As they stepped out into the hallway, his father registered more surprise. “…Yeesh, I need to bring your mother next time. She’d be blown away.”  
  
Shin nodded in agreement, coming to his apartment door and praying it wasn’t more disastrous than he recalled. Opening the threshold, he breathed a sigh of relief that it was perfectly neat except for a few miscellaneous articles of clothing. Yamada entered, looking around. He seemed…awed. “Wow…you know, I don’t know if I was coming up in this time if I _would_ have left this. This is nice.”  
  
“Definitely not the mansion” Shin smiled some, setting his keys on the counter.  
  
“No, but not a hundred percent the nostalgia trip I was expecting. This looks like some Wensington apartments I’ve gone to do house visits to” Yamada murmured before nodding, “…Progress. Progress is good.”  
  
His father sat down on one of the stools Joe left behind near the counter as Shin offered him some water. Nah, his dad wasn’t here for nostalgia. The man cared very little for that. “So, what’s going on, dad? I mean, I’m glad to have you visit and all but even _I_ wasn’t planning on coming back here tonight.”  
  
Yamada frowned as he gave him a glass, turning the cup in his hand, “…Sorry. I’m just never going to be very good at this. I love you all so much that I really want to be but I’m…I’m lacking in some areas.”  
  
“What?” Shin frowned, shaking his head.  
  
“…Your mom started wealthy, as you know. The very moment I met her, she was from one of the wealthiest families in the country. In some respects, I still expect very little of those people and I especially back then expected so very little from her. I was a poor Wasaba kid and…well, when we first met, she was a little snobby. Or so I thought, I think your mother has always been very pragmatic” Yamada explained, sipping his water.  
  
Okay… “Your mother…she wasn’t snobby or uppity at all. She would spend time with me in a grungy garage and go to greasy diners with me to eat. She’d come into Wasaba like it was nothing, I’d never seen anything like it. She is so…incredibly humble and I…I found myself intimidated by that because in my mind, she…she ought not be. She ought to have the very best and only the best. In that time, I could offer her none of it. I can’t count how many times I questioned whether I was good enough for her, how many times I _told_ her I wasn’t—I felt it hard.”  
  
Yamada sipped his water before pinning Shin with a sad expression, “…I just wasn’t expecting to see it in my son tonight.”  
  
…Shit. Shin grimaced, rubbing his arm before slowly shaking his head, wandering to take a seat on the couch facing away from his dad. “…There has to be some reason she won’t consider me, papa. And all I can think is that I’m not good enough for her in her eyes. I—I know in your and mama’s case that there were a lot of serious obstacles in the way that kept you apart. Just—with Lyla and I? What could her dad possibly do? Disown her? They’re not a mob family, they’re not Top 10 Richest in Japan. Why…why won’t she consider me? What am I to her? It-It can _only_ be that I’m not good enough to her.”  
  
When she thought he was going to be a doctor, she was excited. She told him when he decided against it that it wasn’t because he was letting her down but because he could get into anything now, even if it was dangerous. Yes, it ended up being _true_ but what if that wasn’t the truth on her end? What if…what if it was because he was respectable then but not respectable now? She…she didn’t even want his child…  
  
His father resettled beside him, scowling, “Listen to me, Shin: I don’t ever want you questioning if you’re ‘good enough’. If you look in the mirror and see ‘good enough’ to yourself then that is all that matters. I don’t know what Lyla’s circumstances are—I can’t judge them and I won’t. Your mother’s circumstances were _far_ beyond anything I had been prepared for. But I don’t want you to ever look like that again. You are not someone else’s standards. Don’t let her—even your best friend—make you question that.”  
  
Shin pursed his lips before smiling wearily, “…I dunno, dad. You’re…you’re amazing. You’ve done such great things against such incredible odds—you became a surgeon when you were in the slums. You got us a mansion. You’ve given us _everything_. But I have to ask you, of yourself, if you think you’re good enough for mom?”  
  
Yamada fell very silent. Yea, Shin figured. Finally, the man exhaled lowly, “…I guess you’re right, son.”  
  
“Mm.”  
  
“…I just try to be though.”  
  
Eyes widening, he looked to the man. He nodded as if confirming this to himself, “…I won’t accept ‘good enough’ for your mother. I’m always going to push to be better and better for her. She gives me her all and I will do the very same. Your mama deserves past the status quo…I may not be ‘good enough’ in my sight but that doesn’t mean I won’t keep fighting to make sure she has the best from me.”  
  
“…Oh” Shin whispered.  
  
Yamada smiled, patting him on the back, “You coming back home for the night?”  
  
“O-Oh, I guess I have to to get you back to Subami” Shin quickly laughed.  
  
Making a face, his dad drawled, “Well, I _can_ hitch a ride with someone but…”  
  
What now? “I-I-I think not, dad” Shin snorted, standing, “I’ll not have you hitchhiking out of Wasaba because of me. I can definitely stand to crash one more night at the mansion.”  
  
Yamada sighed, following him to the door. Shin wasn’t sure but he swore he heard a muttering of ‘my kids think I’m a punk’. No, no, he was just out of it, nope. Koji told him that their dad ‘seemed interesting’ recently and Shin, while aware of more of his dad’s earlier nuances than the others, was inclined to agree, especially as the man made another unusually wide circle around that square of pavement. Very interesting.  
  
“T-Thanks for talking to me though, dad. I was feeling a little down” Shin murmured as they headed back toward Subami.  
  
“Of course, son, it’s…it’s not something I had before I met your mother and with her I realized how important it was.”  
  
…Shin really wished he could tell his dad about his baby but that might have steered this fulfilling conversation in directions it very much did not need to go. He’d…he’d accept that on his own.  
  
When he pulled back into the mansion, everyone had pretty much evaporated. Appeared like Koji and Nelly had taken off, Jill was on her computer talking to her friends, Tony was on the phone in his room, and Shaun was playing video games. His mother was sitting on the couch, watching television absently. Shin quickly smiled. Man, he had probably been an absolute wet blanket tonight. Going over to her, he kissed her cheek. “I’m sorry I wasn’t good company tonight, mama.”  
  
“Oh, Sweetie Plum, I a hundred percent can understand why” she assured, stroking his hair, “…I worry about it. It looks like a modern day version of my life but I just don’t understand the terms. I hope she’s not in danger.”  
  
…Damn. “I…I’d like to know myself. Either way, congratulations again and I can’t wait to see your show.”  
  
He pouted as she kissed his cheek like he was a baby. His dad dropped beside her, smirking, “Let the boy breathe, Dana.”  
  
“Oh, pooh.”  
  
With a chuckle, Shin excused himself to the deck, saying he was going to get some fresh air. Leaning against the railing for a minute, he couldn’t help gaze at the little space in the foliage. Their ‘jungle’. Against his better judgment, he wandered down the steps and went into the space. He was going for ‘nostalgia’. Instead, he found Lyla.  
  
She was still wearing the dress from the restaurant, sitting on the ground, hugging her knees. Shin stared down at her as she gazed up toward him. He guessed they always found each other in this ‘jungle’, huh? “…Lyla.”  
  
“Shin.”  
  
“…Should you be moving around this much? Y’know, after the procedure. Or have you not had it yet?”  
  
Lyla looked surprised. He hadn’t meant to. He hadn’t meant for it to come out so embittered, he really wanted it to sound concerned. The hurt came out before his intentions though. He…he didn’t understand…  
  
“Shin--”  
  
“Who was that guy tonight? Is that another potential spouse?” he whispered, “Had to be. The way he was looking at you and stuff. As long as it’s not me, right? My kind—my kind is only good for a good time, right?”  
  
She got to her feet, looking angry. “I don’t know what it is you think of me, Yagami Shin, but I would never use anyone for a ‘good time’, _especially_ you.”  
  
“Oh _really_? So then, what _am I_ to you, Lyla?” he glared.  
  
“What am I _to you_?”  
  
“I asked you to _marry me_!” Shin snapped, “It didn’t just _occur to me_ because of the baby—yea, this whole thing with us sleeping together freaked me out in the beginning but it started to feel _right_ , like I had put blinders on because I didn’t want to wreck our friendship before. But the baby? The baby scared me the most because I wouldn’t _be here_ and that really _got me_. It wasn’t the fact I might be a father or—maybe it’s selfish—what it may place you with with your dad, but the fact that I wouldn’t be here to see my first child with you! I _love_ you, Lyla, and I’m sorry if seeing some guy holding your hand with heart eyes pisses me off!”  
  
They were so small when he came through these woods to find her. Never…never in a million years would he have expected to have been standing here, fourteen years later, confessing he loved her. He’d loved her his whole life but…but now what? She…  
  
“…I wasn’t pregnant, Shin.”  
  
…Eh? He stared at her, startled, as she looked back, solemn. What? “…But you-you were crying--”  
  
“…I wanted what you offered” she said so faintly, almost lost on a breeze, “I wanted it so bad. I had wanted a baby there so I had to take that offer because I wanted it.”  
  
What?? Shin got closer, his heart racing, “L-Lyla, I—I’ll offer it now then. Let’s get married. I’ll take care of you. I want to. I-I want to get you to a place where you can make your own choices and-and I want you to have options. We can get married _tonight,_ if you want.”  
  
“His name was Louis. He’s studying biology in college. Very clingy. I don’t know how to deal with clingy after all these years.”  
  
“Lai.”  
  
“I love you, Shin. I…I just need time to think on it, okay? I…wish there had been a baby” she choked, “Then I would have had to and it’s what I want.”  
  
Shin stared at her again, slowly shaking his head, “…I dunno if I would want my child in anything as complicated sounding as that, Lyla. I…I would hope you’d want our baby because it’s ours.”  
  
“…You turned out perfect.”  
  
“What now?”  
  
Her name was called from her side of the yard, sounded like one of her older maids. She shook her head, taking a deep breath, “I-I have to go, Shin. I’m sorry I hurt you. I-I didn’t want him touching me either.”  
  
“Then I’ll break his hand next time.”  
  
Pouting, she rushed to him, giving him a kiss on the lips. “Good night.”  
  
“…Good night.”  
  
Shin watched as she ran back to her side before slowly going back through the vines, pushing them out of the way to get back into the Yagami yard. He stuffed his hands in his pockets and gazed up at the half moon. How…bewildering. And infuriating. She still didn’t tell him what he was to her.  
  
He was too young then. Or not so much that but too naïve, too dull headed to understand implications that formed him but never occurred to him. The duplicities of nostalgia were daunting.  
  
But this was their story to shape.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Something…highly unusual happened. Like, extremely: he went over to Lyla’s house the following day to possibly speak with her some more about the night before. Instead, he ran into ‘Louis’.  
  
He was probably in his early twenties with black hair and big wide-framed glasses. His clothes looked absurdly baggy for his frame and he was shiftily standing on the porch, as if he was trying to garner the strength to knock. Shin was trying to garner the restraint not to _knock him out_. Well…then. That’s when it went into some very strange territory.  
  
Louis jumped when Shin appeared behind him, staring up at him, wide-eyed. Shin stared back drolly, prepared to threaten that he keep his hands off Lyla. He was going to accomplish _something_ today.  
  
“Oh! Are you Lyla’s friend, Shin?”  
  
…What? “…Yea?”  
  
The guy gasped, “Finally! You’re the soldier, right?”  
  
Eh? “I-I mean, not-not _yet_ but--”  
  
“Perfect! We need to get to a computer!”  
  
While any actually normal person would demand what the hell this perfect stranger was talking about all of a sudden, for the briefest of moments, Shin got caught up in the sheer action thriller movie feel of it all. It sounded like Louis needed to deactivate a bomb somewhere. He did actually lead him to the computer downstairs in his house before it struck him he was a damn _idiot_. “Look, _Louis--_ ”  
  
The guy was sitting in the desk chair, twiddling his fingers as the dial-up squealed and screeched to a connection. “One day, we’ll have internet that is just…free. You can access it from everywhere and anything. Even your refrigerator.”  
  
“Uh…huh. Anyway--”

“So!” Louis gushed, “The Terran Initiative.”  
  
What? Shin’s eyes widened as the man pulled up a webpage on Geocities, just a blank white page with walls of text. “Are you familiar with the agricultural methods of the Terrans or ‘Earthmates’?”  
  
“…No.”  
  
“It is a method that the Terran sect uses to produce crops without robbing the land of its nutrients. They call the material they use ‘runes’ and it gets deemed ‘magic’ almost. However, it is a form of botany that utilizes the basic essence of the specimen and secures a strong harvest. Sometimes they are even able to generate large plants! And _that_ is the real reason the Sechs’ Syndicate wants the Terrans.”  
  
 _Eh_? Shin stared at him, shocked, “…What?”  
  
“The Sech’s Syndicate wants this science and research in order to use it for _capital_. Whereas the Terrans want to preserve the Earth, the Sechs will ravage the planet and not use the principles at hand. _That_ is the true reason for the genocide.”  
  
Shin slowly shook his head, grabbing a miscellaneous chair from the corner and sitting. “…No way, we’ve been told it’s because of religious persecution.”  
  
Louis turned to face him, pointing his finger into his palm heavily, “Say you want to make sure only _you_ gain access to something that will increase your capital by 300%. You don’t want anyone _else_ trying to fight you for it and you don’t want to split those margins. The next best thing is to say you’re ‘persecuting their religion’ and ‘killing them’ when really you’re trying to torture centuries of agricultural information out of them.”  
  
Biting his lip, Shin…mused. “…Breaking them up into sections?”  
  
“You’re still trying to break their spirit. You break them into sections, separate families, you demoralize them. They stand a better chance of breaking if you suggest if they provide the information, they’ll see their family” Louis rationalized.  
  
“But…but why not _tell_ then? To just end this and gain their freedom.”  
  
Louis grunted, “Are you familiar with American history, Yagami-san? What’s the chances they just let those people free?”  
  
…Damn. He…he was right, one of them cracked and told, the Sechs would probably just force them to use their technology on the crops and grow it for them. “This…this is pretty fascinating, really--”  
  
“I have written a full journal of documentation on this with correlating evidence! I’ve tried sending it to our embassies and to the military but no one pays it any attention! I want to hear what you think” Louis insisted, gazing at him.  
  
Shin swallowed, crossing his arms. Breaking them. That…. “I think it’s the sickest thing I ever heard. Not that persecuting them for a religion was any better but now they’re being held prisoner for monetary gain? Per your research any way.”  
  
”Not a hundred percent anyway” Louis nodded.  
  
What? Louis scrolled down his page and came to a bolded header reading ‘Desert Storm’. “One of the main Sechs’ operatives, his son was in the Army for I believe England? Anyway, his son was ambushed, supposedly, by Terrans during a fire fight and killed. He is largely credited with founding the Sechs’ Order.”  
  
“…For revenge.”  
  
“And money!” Louis proclaimed frantically, “If he can get enough money, he can start funding for his true goal—the destruction of the Terran homeland.”

While Shin was hardly a fan of conspiracy theories, this was a very…interesting suggestion. He _had_ heard that a prime member of the Sechs’ Initiative was the bitter father of a fallen soldier. Would the man be so cruel though to use the people’s own infrastructure to _destroy_ them? Additionally, how…how do you just kill indiscriminately?  
  
…Would…he have to?  
  
“I’m…just going to be a foot soldier so I can hardly see me being the best point of contact for this” Shin explained slowly.  
  
“Are you _always_ going to be a foot soldier?”  
  
Shin was startled. “I-I mean, I…I guess the intention _is_ to climb the ranks, but it’s not a given.”  
  
“This has been going on for years” Louis sighed, “While it is easy for us to sit here and say what I’m about to say, while if you can get anyone to listen _now_ it’d be better, it can…wait. The Terrans believe in their goals of maintaining the Earth’s integrity, they won’t break and they’ll be killed for it.”  
  
“That’s…pretty brutal” Shin whispered.  
  
Louis nodded in agreement. “I’ll keep finding correlations and building a case in the meantime. When Okamoto-san talked about you, I just got this feeling you’d be the source to get this into play.”  
  
…. _Oh yea_. “Oh yea, Lyla. I saw you last night with her” Shin’s eyes narrowed, remembering his actual mission.  
  
“Yes, my mom is worried I’ll die an unwed spinster nerd” Louis sighed deeply, closing out of his page and signing off, “You know, being a ‘paranoid nerd’ and all.”  
  
…Oh. “W-Well, still--”  
  
Louis waved a hand, “She played me well, she knew I’d be at least slightly bewitched with a descendant from the Miriel Experiments. Just a perfect ancestor of genetic excellence.”  
  
What now? Shin stared at him before drawling, “…You were admiring her…genetics.”  
  
“Don’t you?” Louis gasped.  
  
“…Probably…not in the exact same way, no.”  
  
Pushing his glasses up, Louis pointed up, reminding him of a teacher from an anime, “The Miriel Experiments were ahead of their time, Yagami-san! It was able to completely mutate the human gene in a set group of people to alter the color of their hair and eyes from the standard! Lyla is a just a beautiful example of science!”  
  
Shin wasn’t sure what to say to that either. “…She’s a little more than that, Louis.”  
  
“I know, that’s why I came by to advise I’m withdrawing my omiai.”  
  
Eh? Gaping, Shin slowly shook his head. What? “J-Just like that?”  
  
“She’s a lovely young woman, sure! But I just don’t think she seemed very interested in me and while I wouldn’t mind getting to know her, I don’t want to force her in a direction she doesn’t want to go.”  
  
How… _respectful_. “I…I’m a little surprised, Louis, I really thought I was going to have to threaten you to leave her alone.”  
  
Louis huffed, stuffing his hands in his baggy pockets, “Just because I’m a ‘nerd’, Yagami-san, doesn’t mean I’m some social blunder.”  
  
Man. “You’re…you’re right. I’m sorry. My family’s not used to…reasonable people.”  
  
“Ha, well, they are in short supply.”  
  
“…Shin?”  
  
Shin slowly looked around, alarmed, as Okamoto Lyla stood there, also looking shocked. “O-Oh! Lai!”  
  
…Last night he swore to her he was going to get this guy to leave her alone. Now here he was sitting in their family room. Louis smiled, “Good Afternoon, Okamoto-san. I had come by to see you but ran into Yagami-san first. We were talking about his future military plans.”  
  
“O-Oh.”  
  
“Also, I was telling him that I was going to withdraw my omiai. I apologize if I made you uncomfortable last night, I was a little taken with the…wrong things. But I recognize I’m also not in a place for a long-term relationship.”  
  
Lyla looked to Shin quickly, a little questioning. Louis, however, laughed, “He didn’t threaten me. He was surprised he didn’t have to.”  
  
Standing, he bowed, “Well, I best get back to school. Good luck in your endeavors, Yagami-san, Okamoto-san.”  
  
“A-Ah, you as well” Shin blurted, standing and shaking his hand.  
  
She nodded, smiling softly, “Yes, same.”  
  
They both walked him to the door, watching him go back next door to probably grab his moped. Shin crossed his arms, glancing to Lyla who gazed after Louis, “…I hate to say it, Lai, but…he was probably a nice guy for you to consider.”  
  
“Possibly.”  
  
He moved away as she shut the door, staring at him solemnly, “…Have you moved back home?”  
  
Shin shrugged some, sighing, “Probably around June when the apartment lease is up. I’ll probably go back tonight.”  
  
To say he was surprised would be a lie but he was a little confused when Lyla grasped his hand, walking him toward the steps. “Lai, I’m going to stop you right here.”  
  
She pouted as he gave her a look, probably a little annoyed. “We _just_ had a pregnancy scare and I am not eager to just go back to our…antics just yet. I’ll get you a toy first.”  
  
Lyla sulked, continuing to pull him, “I don’t want a toy. I want you.”  
  
Oh boy. “L-Lyla, look--” he flustered as they made it to his wing.  
  
… _Wrapped around her finger._ Grunting, he pulled her to a stop, hugging her against him. “Lyla…I don’t want to, okay? Let’s-Let’s just leave it at that.”  
  
There were about, oh, several problems with what he just said. All of them were that he was lying, he didn’t necessarily _have_ to but there was room in his ledger for it. And that was where there was a problem, Lyla knew when he was just _trying_ to be practical versus when he was actually disinterested, she picked that up long before they became intimate. He swallowed hard as she gazed up at him with doe eyes, her lids heavy. Still. _Still,_ stay…stay strong.  
  
He breathed in as she kissed him, her hands running down his chest as she grabbed the ends of his shirt. They were in the long hallway where usually only he occupied but, given his siblings, this was very much public at this point. _No_. Shin quickly grabbed her hands, leering and tipping his head away, “Lyla, I mean it.”  
  
“Fine. Sorry” she whispered.  
  
Taking a deep breath as she pulled away, he raised a brow as she walked toward his bedroom. “Where are you going?”  
  
“You said I could masturbate in your bedroom when I need to, right?”  
  
All he could do was stare at her as she stared back, seeming serious as a heart attack right now. What in the hell. “…I do recall saying that, yes.”  
  
“It’s no longer true?”  
  
“…I-I guess I have no…no reason to renege, no.”  
  
He exhaled hard when she wandered into his bedroom, closing the door. Little did she know, it was a wrap if she’d asked him to watch. Watch her touch herself and her little…sighs…  
  
No. No, she knew this would break you like a twig. _Knew_. She was probably just going to go in there and start making sounds to get him going and he’d…  
  
Covering his mouth as he got an erection, he shook his head. Wrapped around her damn finger. She didn’t even have to _try_ that hard. Weakly going to the door, he cleared his throat, “U-Uh, Lai?”  
  
“Yes?”  
  
He slowly entered, a little alarmed to find her stretched across his bed, half-naked. She had on the slinkiest pink panties and bra. How did she get away with this stuff? Her eyes were half closed as she indeed rubbed her lower half over the panties. “What’s wrong?”  
  
“Um…” he twiddled his fingers, “Well…”  
  
She stuck out her tongue, “You said you didn’t want to. No takebacks.”  
  
Damn it. “O-Okay, you’re-you’re right. I’m sorry.”  
  
But of course not. Lyla giggled and sat up, waggling her finger at him, “You’re silly, Shin.”  
  
Was he though? He shyly walked over and she made him stretch out beside her. His heart started to race as she kneeled between his legs, unzipping his jeans. “I overheard a conversation at school, Shin. They were talking about sizes.”  
  
“Oh?”  
  
“Mm hmm. They were talking about the biggest ones they’d seen” she murmured, kneading him over his boxers. “But none of them sounded as big as yours. I wanted to gloat but I didn’t want them to come looking.”  
  
“Don’t know how to take that, Lyla, not gonna lie…”  
  
She smiled, untucking him and leaning over, her soft lips wrapping around one of his balls. Fuck. He shut his eyes, his lips parting as her tongue juggled the flesh up and down, her hand doing the same to his rapidly hardening shaft, jerking. Fuck. “H-Hold on, Lai.”  
  
She pulled away, frowning, but gasped when he grabbed her thighs, turning her so her lower half was pointing toward his face. Lyla pouted…but sank her mouth down over his length, running her tongue against the head. _Fuck_. But…but this worked. If he could make her orgasm without his penis then…  
  
But of course, the second his finger ran down the fold in her panties, he trembled. Fuck, she was wet. She’d been wet since she got over here, damn. Composing himself, he slid the garments to her knees, parting her puffy lips and thumbed her clit. She whimpered over his cock and he was…again losing his will. “Lyla, did…did you get this…excited before we started having sex?”  
  
Pulling her mouth from its task, she continued to stroke him as she replied: “Yes. I’ve wanted your penis since we were fourteen.”  
  
Shin felt his face _burn_ , “For _fuck’s sake_ , Lyla.”  
  
“It’s true! I just didn’t really _know_ it was exactly what I wanted. I wasn’t even sure then why I felt like that but I wanted you. That’s why I would disappear sometimes, it was very uncomfortable.”  
  
“Why…why didn’t you talk to me about it then? I-I mean, you had _some_ grasp on sex. How you described it was sickening but you were told how to be…versed in pleasing your husband. It’s at least in the same vein.”  
  
Lyla shook her head, “I was never told _I_ was allowed to want it too.”  
  
Shit. He gnawed his lip as she continued what she had been doing while he was running his fingers around her slick flesh. That…that made sense. ‘We have parts now’. Just damn, fourteen. Well…luckily it was just coming to light now because if how easily she could coerce him now was any sign, fourteen? Oh, his pubescent self would have been on board immediately.  
  
She moaned over his cock as he fingered her, that squelch about to do him in as it always did. That wet fucking pussy…  
  
“A-AH!” she choked as grabbed her thighs and pulled them right into face, driving his tongue into her sex.  
  
Huh. Was not even drunk. She just did this to him, he guessed. “S-Shin! Shin, please, n-no, a-ah.”  
  
Licking her hard clit, he slid his finger into her ass and she shook. “A-Ah, Shin, please. Please, I want it. I want it there.”  
  
Oh really? Sucking his lips, he sat up and reached for his drawer, finding a near empty bottle of lube. She whimpered as he slid two fingers inside of her, getting her nice and oiled. Her pussy was convulsing with _just_ that. Without really…thinking, he kind of patted her ass a little hard.  
  
She _jumped_. It caught him off guard too. “O-Oh, so-sorry, Lyla.”  
  
“…It’s fine.”  
  
“N-No. That reaction, it wasn’t. Sorry.”  
  
Shaking her head, she mumbled, “It…it was fine. Everything is different when you do it.”  
  
… _What_? Flabbergasted by the amount of questions that statement raised, she actually wiggled her hips. “Do it again.”  
  
“What?”  
  
“Do it again.”  
  
He wasn’t…particularly into that as a kink, it was just kind of a thing to idly do? Just what did she mean? Who…who was spanking her? Scowling, he sat up and slapped his hand against her ass. While he meant to say ‘who did that to you before me?’, he admittedly got immediately distracted by the jiggle. “Damn.”  
  
“Mm, I want it so bad. Put it in, Shin.”  
  
Gulping, his eyes rolled back as he went into her other available opening, almost coming immediately. “Fuck, it’s so tight…”  
  
Her knees were giving out, sobbing, as he thrust back and forth. “F-Fuck. Fuck, Shin.”  
  
Pulling out, he turned her over on her back, getting her lubricated again, before slipping back in. She choked, moaning as fingered her pussy and continued to tap her ass gently. Fuck. Fuck. Shin groaned, getting down on his elbows and rolling his hips against her. She kissed him hard and hugged his neck, whispering his name. She was so damn sexy.  
  
…What was his problem? Why was he so…intoxicated with her? Was…was this what his dad felt about his mom? This was nuts. He felt like an idiot.  
  
“Mm, Shin…”  
  
After they both finished, curled up in his bed at freakin’ 3 pm on a Saturday, Lyla looked at him sleepily. “Let’s take a nap and go for a movie, maybe?”  
  
“Sure. Sounds good…” he mumbled, shutting his eyes.  
  
She kissed his temple suddenly, snuggling into his arms, “…I love you, Shin.”  
  
“I…I love you too, Lyla.”  
  
…Louis wasn’t an issue. The guy was just really taken with Lyla’s beauty, as he should be, she was gorgeous. Alas, the man wasn’t going to harass her and Shin was thankful for that. He was also pretty thankful no violence was necessary and that, actually, Louis had introduced him to some new possibilities. It didn’t make not one thing better but…now he might have to look at his enemy differently. Bigotry or capitalism, those…those were very jaded goals irrespective, but, one was based on beliefs and one was based on greed. He couldn’t weight them but those motivations created a different type of person.  
  
Motivations…made a lot of things look different.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

“Oh, what do you think Koji and Nelly would like?”  
  
“Those two don’t need _anything,_ Lyla, but a good punch to the head.”  
  
Yagami Shin wandered around the mall with Okamoto Lyla, absently looking at shirts as the pink haired woman fretted over what to get those two spoiled brothers of his for their birthday. They wanted for _nothing_ , none of them did. _He_ wanted for nothing. For his birthday, they went for conveyor belt sushi and to ride roller coasters, it was simple as can be. Oh, but Koji and Nelly? About to have the biggest damn house party possible because, just so happened, them graduating from high school and their birthday coincided. Figures.  
  
Lyla giggled, picking up a black graphic shirt to look over. “They’re so difficult. If they want a video game, they buy it. If they want a CD, they buy it. Maybe a manga?”  
  
“Maybe. Or maybe something for their dorm room.”  
  
“Oh! That’s a good idea, I’ll--”  
  
Her phone started to ring, interrupting her musings. She frowned, taking the device from her purse and instantly numbed. Her dad. “One second, Shin.”  
  
Nodding, he tipped his head, “I’m going to go look at games.”  
  
“Okay.”  
  
Wandering around the video game store, figuring he _would_ get the knuckleheads something, Shin’s phone also went off. Frowning, he looked at the contact name. Oh, Yaya. Pressing it to his ear, he answered, “Hello?”  
  
“Hello, Shin. How are you?”  
  
“Pretty good, out with Lyla shopping for presents for Koji and Nelly. They’re turning eighteen tomorrow.”  
  
“My God, eighteen. It’s been so long…”  
  
Nodding in agreement, he picked up an N64 box for a random looking game. The hell? Farming? Making a face and setting it back down, Shin went over to the Playstation section. “What’s going on, Yaya?”  
  
“I’m actually about to go abroad for some months, dear, so I’ll miss your departure. I was hoping you could come by in the next few days so I can see you.”

  
“Oh” he frowned, pausing, when Lyla walked in, “Let me check with Lyla real quick and I may have time tonight, if you’re available.”  
  
“Sounds perfect. Just call to let me know” Ayame requested.   
  
Parting with her, he smiled when Lyla came up to him with a frown. She always frowned coming off of communication with her father. “Hey, babe, what was that about?”  
  
“…I’m not sure. He wants me home immediately. Sorry, I’ll…I’ll get something for the twins later.”  
  
Shin nodded, stroking her hair back, “Don’t fret. Whatever it is _this time_ , or whomever, we’ll get through it.”  
  
Lyla gave him a smile then, holding his hand as they exited the place. They drove back listening to Binaural, the new Pearl Jam album. It…wasn’t his favorite, not after all the epic songs Pearl Jam had done in the past. The songs he and Lyla had grown up on, like Jeremy and Black…he remembered thinking that. He remembered…he remembered about a third of the way to her house, ‘Parting Ways’ came on. He’d been through so much and he always…he always remembered that.   
  
_Behind her eyes there's curtains but they've been closed to hide the flames. Remains… She knows their future's burning but she can smile just the same. Same… And though her mood is fine today. There's a fear they'll soon be parting ways…_

_Standing like a statue; A chin of stone, a heart of clay. Hey… And though he's too big a man to say.  
There's a fear they'll soon be parting ways…_

_Drifting away…  
  
_ Shin stopped at the light a turn from entering the neighborhood they grew up in and glanced to Lyla before doing a doubletake. Tears were rolling down her cheeks, he green eyes slightly closed. Eh? “B-Babe, what’s wrong?”  
  
“Nothing.”  
  
“Is it the song?” he demanded, quickly turning it off.   
  
Rapidly shaking her head, she breathed in as she buried her face in her hands. What? Scowling deeply, he stopped in front of his house and parked, turning to look at her. “What did he say to you?”  
  
“N-Nothing, Shin, really. I was just thinking about how this…this is coming to a close for us. You’re…you’re about to be away.”  
  
He grimaced and hugged her, kissing her temple. “…It’ll be tough, Lyla. I…”  
  
….Tomorrow. Tomorrow. She kissed him on the lips, murmuring when she pulled away, “…I got you a charm. I know you hate things like that and don’t believe in it but…if you can just carry it, for me? To…to give me the peace of mind?”  
  
Shin didn’t want to upset her with his sensibilities so he nodded. She handed him the little parcel and closed his hands around it. Wait, wait. “Lai, why are you acting like this is the last time I’ll see you? It’s May, I don’t leave for three more months. Plus, you’re coming to the party tomorrow, right?”  
  
“Oh, yes, just it may be busy, you know? I just don’t want to forget.”  
  
…Kay. He drove the rest of the way toward her house and drawled, “I…work tomorrow so I’ll see you at 8?”  
  
“Mm” she nodded, wiping her eyes.  
  
“Lyla…what’s going on? I feel like I’m not getting the whole story, baby.”  
  
She suddenly laughed. What? “You know that you and the kids are the only ones to give me a nickname?”  
  
“Does it bother you? I…I guess it is weird to start calling you ‘baby’ without preamble” he flustered.  
  
Lyla smiled. Like most things she did, it seemed…a little forlorn. “No. I like being your baby, Shin.”  
  
Opening the door, she exhaled, “I better go, Shin. I love you and I’ll see you tomorrow.”  
  
“I love you too, Lai…”  
  
What an uneasy feeling. He watched her walk to the door before pulling out of her equally long yard to go back to his. While he had enjoyed the solitude to a degree, after Lyla and his…rendezvous following his meeting with Louis, he realized he definitely could be saving money not having an apartment. Not to mention he wasn’t keen on working that hard before he was about to be shipped off. One day, but, he definitely wanted to have his mind in the right place. He spoke with one of his dad’s old friend’s daughters and she was interested in staying in the apartment on the ground he paid 2000 pieces toward the rent until his lease was up which was very manageable. He cut back to part time at the grocery store and now he was back home. It definitely had _slightly_ cut into his time with Lyla, he wasn’t quite as…comfortable getting with Lyla like that at home but maybe that was for the best.  
  
Ah, now Yaya. This worked out. Calling the woman to advise he could be at her place in the city when she was ready, she advised him 8 would be perfect. Cool. In the meantime, he supposed he’d start dinner for his siblings…  
  
“Tadaima.”  
  
Shin looked up from the refrigerator, startled, as his dad wandered in, rubbing his face. “Oh, okaeri, dad. I’m surprised to see you home given…you left this morning.”  
  
His dad would be gone for _days_ at a time. It was so rare now to see him leave and come back within the same day. The man indeed smirked at this as he dropped into a chair at the table, rubbing his neck. “Mm, that’ll be for tomorrow when your siblings are hosting their extravagant…fest.”  
  
Oh yea, Shin snickered. Removing some chicken for yakitori, Shin shook his head. “Well…I guess one more soiree and they’ll be off doing God knows what in college.”  
  
“I am definitely not comforted by what they can get up to in college, that’s for sure” Yamada murmured, closing his eyes  
  
Shin smirked, “Did you not get into any shenanigans in college, dad?”  
  
“Son, I could neither afford nor even comprehend shenanigans by the time I was in college, I was so broke and tired.”  
  
Ah, yea… “That’s kind of sad, dad. I mean, granted, I’m not either but we had some goofing off in the army after hours at least.”  
  
“Pfft” Yamada groaned, reaching over to grab an apple from the fruit basket in the center of the table, “I won’t get into any details but I definitely did _not_ miss out on shenanigans.”  
  
Oh really? Shin still somehow pictured his dad as having gone to one party in his life and figuring that was it but who knows? “Well, speaking of the old days, I’m going to go visit Yaya tonight at 8. She’s going abroad in a few days and won’t get to see me leave, apparently.”  
  
Yamada nodded. That…was it. Shin made a face as he made the sauce for his chicken. “Dad…when exactly is the last time you’ve _purposefully_ seen Yaya?”  
  
“I saw her at a doctor’s conference late last year” Yamada drawled, picking up the paper as he munched.  
  
“ _Purposefully_.”  
  
“…Uh…the eighties.”  
  
While it was on the tip of his tongue to demand exactly what the deal with that is, Shin knew he’d be shooting a dead horse and left it at that. He could ask her tonight what she thought it was. His dad was full of shenanigans whether he thought so or not. That woman helped raise him, helped make sure his dad had someone there raising his son while he was getting his degree—yes, his mom was the motivation, Shin got that, but, even though it wasn’t close to his mom’s fault, Yaya helped execute that. His dad could at least have called to check on her in _twenty years_.  
  
And, that having been his thought when he headed out toward her segment of town called Konohana, Shin took her some dinner. Only Shaun and Koji had shown up, the latter because he was needing to ‘crash’ for a bit. That kid was going to burn himself out if he kept it up but, well, Shin couldn’t gripe too much. He kept immaculate grades, made sure the kids did, and kept a part-time job all whilst this partying. Credit where credit was due, Yagami Koji should fare fine in college.  
  
Konohana was very traditional. The apartments were really just an old converted ryokan. It seemed a little strange given Ayame was a ‘city kid’ but he knew she probably wanted to get away from that. Parking in the aligning lot, he wandered into the building and came to her door, ringing the doorbell.  
  
The doors even slid, such a whimsical thing. Yaya was still wearing her doctor’s jacket, her hair pulled back into a ponytail. “Hey, Sweetie. Sorry, I wanted to have some food prepared but I ended up crashing on the couch.”  
  
“That’s fine, I actually brought you some” he smiled, handing her the bento.  
  
“Oh, thank you! God, cooking for me too” she sighed, setting it on the table, “I guess you really are my little adult.”  
  
Shin sighed, sitting beside her, “Sometimes. I was staying at Joe’s old place but got a little concerned about being too stressed when I deployed so I went home. It was…fun while it lasted but I think I am spoiled.”  
  
“No, you’re doing the right thing: you shouldn’t be stressed out and going into a warzone” Ayame grunted, standing to get some chopsticks, “I commend you for thinking of your mental health.”  
  
That mental health thing again. She had mentioned his dad had some stress disorder too… about to ask what exactly happened, Ayame drawled when she sat down, “So you said you were with Lyla when I called?”  
  
“Oh yea, we were hanging out and doing some shopping.”  
  
Raising a brow, she nodded slowly, “So…you’re dating?”  
  
“Eh? Oh, uh, we’re…something. It’s complicated” Shin explained.  
  
Ayame gave him a look. “‘It’s complicated’? Either you’re seeing each other or you’re not, Shin.”  
  
“I-I mean, I’ve _asked_ her but things are a little different on her end, Yaya: she’s from a really rich family and I think she’s expected to marry a rich guy. I think she’s a little afraid to commit to me with all that going on but I’m going to convince her. I want to give her a promise ring before I leave so she knows I’ll take care of her.”  
  
He…didn’t expect it, but her look slightly darkened. What? “…You’re definitely your father’s son, Shin.”  
  
…What? “What…does that mean?”  
  
She shrugged, nibbling at the pickled carrots. What? No. “I mean, what are you suggesting, Yaya? Why am I my father’s son with reassuring the person I love that I’ll have their back?”  
  
“It’s a nice thought, Shin, it really is” he assured, setting her chopsticks down, “Just not very pragmatic. She could be married while you’re off on your deployment and it’d be out of your control.”  
  
Swallowing, he gripped his hand. It…wasn’t something he’d never thought about. Her dad was clearly looking for a suitor for her, just…  
  
…Wait, his dad? Shin’s brows furrowed as Yaya drank her tea. Wait. “…I mean, you said I’m my dad’s son with that. I can see the similarities, definitely, but it definitely worked out for him: he got my mom back and they’ve been married for over a decade now. It worked out.”  
  
“Oh, it did” she smiled…some.  
  
…What? “…Yaya, you’re my dad’s best friend’s sister and you…you were a critical point in my dad’s life that made sure he got off the ground, you _raised_ me. Why…why hasn’t he seen you in so long?”  
  
She shrugged, going to her fridge, “You want a beer?”  
  
“…Sure.”  
  
She handed him a can of Kirin lager and sat down with hers, clicking the little tab and drinking the foaming beverage. Why didn’t he like what he was feeling here either? Opening his, he drank quietly, looking around the one room apartment. It was small. Quaint enough for a single person, just… “…Yaya, you told me once that you wanted to marry and have kids one day. Any lucky guy?”  
  
“Nah. Still waiting” she droned.  
  
“Oh. Anyone in particular?” he questioned, sipping the amber ale.  
  
Ayame blinked at him languidly. “Is that a roundabout way of asking if I’m waiting on your father?”  
  
“… _No_?”  
  
What the hell? Shin stared at her as she glanced away. “Oh.”  
  
“Why-why would you _think_ that? Roundabout?? What are you—what are you suggesting?”   
  
Ayame waved a hand, standing and wandering toward the back balcony window. She didn’t say anything as she gazed out in the distance. Oh no, Shin did _not_ like what he was feeling here. He was also not liking the picture this puzzle was starting to create. “…Yaya, did you tell my dad you had _feelings_ for him in the eighties?”  
  
“It doesn’t matter, Shin.”  
  
Doesn’t _matter_? “Yaya! That’s—the woman my dad was working toward was my _mom_. My-my _mama_. My dad is _nuts_ about her.”  
  
With a glower, she shook her head, “…I raised you, Shin. At the end of the day, _I_ raised you.”  
  
“For five years, _yea--_ ”  
  
“I raised you from _infanthood_ —I watched you every. Single. Day. I cooked, I cleaned, I even took care of your father when he was sick—I was _there_. My _presence_ did not put Yamada in any danger like hers did. I never _once_ went off and ended up _married_ because of my ‘circumstances’. I did not string him along until the-the most _dire_ of circumstances forced my hand to come back to him. I would have _never_ gave back his ring.”  
  
… _What_? “And that’s what I’m saying, Shin: don’t get caught up in a rich girl with ‘circumstances’. You have enough on your plate as is.”  
  
What the fuck. “…So let me guess: my dad turned you down?”  
  
Her dark eyes cut toward him. Like Mick, he was very much trying to keep calm but he guessed anger did run deep with or without baggage. “…You’re old enough to know, but your dad started seeing some other woman. I forgot her name, Suzie, Suzue or something. I thought it was a step in a healthy direction.”  
  
…He…did vaguely recall that, actually. Leaning back, a little perturbed given that meant his dad _had_ messed around on his mom, he could only nod. Ayame took a long sip of the beer before setting the empty can down with a clank on her coffee table. She sat on the couch, stretching her arms across the back.  
  
“I don’t know what happened. One night, I was about to put you to bed while he was on a date with Suzue or whatever and, suddenly, your mom pops up in a pissed off rage with your brothers. She did that, y’know? Just…popped up.”  
  
She went through _hell_ to get to that point! His mother took fucking beatings from her ex-husband just to see him! “I didn’t even know what to say. I was too young, else I would have told her that Yamada had broken it off, was seeing someone else—he was going to focus on something else like he deserved to do. But I couldn’t, so I left like I always did—except, I was living with you and your dad at the time so I just went to a friends for a while. When I got back, I heard them going at it in his room—that’s probably where your sister and younger brother came from.”  
  
Speechless, he just gaped at her. “Oh, I was _so_ mad. Just snatched right back into the web again! I left again and didn’t come back until that afternoon, only to learn that she had left the ring your dad gave her, their wedding ring. He wasn’t bothered. I took that to mean he’d finally found clarity: he didn’t need to fight so hard for someone.”  
  
… “So, after he enrolled you in kindergarten and took me to make sure that they knew I was your guardian there, I thought. I thought: ‘I am here. I am a staple in these two’s lives. I _know_ Yamada can leave her, he doesn’t even care that she left him’. I made my move: I snuck into his bed one night.”  
  
…Holy shit. Ayame actually…shrugged, “Your dad was out cold. When he got up for his shift, he found me there and asked what was going on. I told him I wanted to take her place in his heart and his bed. I already had anyway, I was more of a wife to him than she’d ever been. I told him I’d cook for him, I’d support him, I’d bend over for him when he wanted it—I told him I’d have his children and that you were already mine. He went _ballistic._ He said that Shin only had _one_ mother and while he was grateful for all that I had done, it was never going to be like that between us. Just like that, he chose her. Because of circumstances.”  
  
“Oh _really_?”  
  
Ayame looked to him, her eyes half closed. Stay…calm, Shin. “Were you…aware of all the nuances of what occurred with my mother? Or am I to assume you just hadn’t cared?”  
  
“‘Circumstances’, Shin.”  
  
“ _Circumstances_?” he spat, flying to his feet, “D-Do you know what my mother had to do to make sure I wasn’t _aborted_? Do-Do you know she was locked in her room and surrounded by guards with no way out and she _cut a hole in the floor_ to _crawl under the house_ in the rain and mud to get me out? Do-Do you realize she was fucking _sixteen_ when that happened? Do you realize she _wanted and did_ marry my father? Do you understand that, in order to have _any place_ in my life, she had to get a fucking beating to do it?”  
  
“Shin--”  
  
“Do you _realize_ I can put two and two together and conclude that because your bastard brother ratted my parents out that _he’s_ the reason my mother got dragged away from my dad and forced to marry that same abusive prick?! Do you realize your brother is the groundwork for why my baby brother was getting fucking raped as a toddler?!”  
  
Ayame gawked as he seethed, “Yes, _Ayame_ , there were ‘circumstances’ but my mom _suffered her ass off_ to get where they are along with my dad! Don’t-don’t you _dare_ belittle either of them like that! My family suffered the _entire way!_ I’m sorry you didn’t ‘get a piece’!”  
  
“Shin!”  
  
Stalking out before he said anything else, he ran to his car and revved it, gunning his way up the street. His eyes were blurry with rage and incensed tears. What-what in the hell…?   
  
…Well…maybe his dad wasn’t as full of shenanigans as he imagined.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 **End notes:**  
  


So a lot of the Wasaba characters are just the…less crazy Harvest Sprites’ names from DS/DS Cute.

If you read Dirty, you already know what ‘Reikoku’ is referring to…and that Yamada isn’t playing it off, he really is just like ‘Wasaba is weird’.

Lightning Crashes is by Live.  
  
During the pregnancy announcement, Shin was listening to Sonnet by The Verve. Yea, there were other songs other than ‘The Freshman’. When I was young I knew everythingggg.  
  
Gary is the snail from Spongebob Squarepants.  
  
HAHHAHA…Geocities. God, I’m old.

Louis marks the FIRST TIME I was able to grab the reigns from my imagination and say ‘DO NOT MAKE THIS PERSON A VILLAIN, RYUU’. I’m excited about that! But Louis is referring to the character from Save the Homeland/Magical Melody/Hero of Leaf Valley. He was Lyla’s love interest.

I think it hovers between being called Miriel and Mariel in this story but it’s some experimentation that led to the unusual hair colors and eyes. It’s actually going to become a topic in I think ‘Trust’ and my story with Gale/The Wizard.  
  
META MOMENT? HM64 came out in 1999. It’d be a little…ambitious but hey, maybe they do have a version of Bokumono in their Bokumono-based world.


	8. Departure

**Nomad,** Shin’s Story  
 **Chapter 8** : Departure

**Author’s Notes:** FOUR MONTHS LATER.  
  
My bad, ya’ll. I wanted to finish it first before releasing it…then the whole unrest with America’s racial injustice was making me feel some kind of militant too…I just had to stop releases for a while. But we’re back, ya’ll, and…well, some updates.

I would…be mistaken to call this a short story. It’s…almost 700 collected pages. That is a…large novel. So, I’m going to try to do daily releases until it’s released completely. I just have one more side story to complete which I’m actually absolutely certain I can crank out because I’m in my feelings.  
  
I hope everyone is enjoying the FOMT remake! “Enjoy”…

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_He’d needed to cool off. He drove around until at least 11 before he was even a semblance of calmer. He just…needed to sleep. He was becoming the next angry one in the family and it wouldn’t do him any good, especially with where he was going.  
  
When he walked in, he heard the hum of the television in the living room. Taking a deep breath, he went in to peek. His mom was curled into the nook of the chaise portion of the couch. His dad was actually leaned against her side, fast asleep, his long body stretched across the remainder of the couch. What was really surprising, however, was that Koji was lying on the chaise, his head rested on their mom’s thigh, also asleep. How…  
  
…How could Yaya…? His mom looked up sleepily before smiling, “Hey, Shin.”  
  
“…Hi, mama.”  
  
She frowned, her brows furrowing, “What’s wrong, Sweetie Plum?”  
  
“N-Nothing” he smiled quickly, “Long…long night.”  
  
She coaxed him over and had him sit on the floor, petting his hair, “What’s the matter? Are you nervous?”  
  
Nervous? “Oh, uh, a little, but just…I love you, mama. I…I wish things had been a bit different.”  
  
Honestly, as much as it infuriated him, he couldn’t blame Yaya: he would start to feel the exact same way. She was LIVING with them, for God’s sake. He would definitely feel like he had a vital place there and…she did. She did, really, just…it wasn’t the place she thought it was.   
  
His mother looked confused. She probably had no idea. Hell, he hadn’t known until she asked him to deliver them one year but she sent Yaya flowers for her birthday, said she ‘owed her’. God. Smiling weakly, he stood and kissed her cheek, “Um, you want me to get this cretin up so you and dad can go to bed?”  
  
Dana snickered, stroking Koji’s hair. Koji was…such a light sleeper but Shin realized immediately he was out cold, his jaw slack with his slightly heavier breathing. “No, he’s sleeping like a baby for once so I’ll hang tight with them.”  
  
He swallowed, nodding as his phone buzzed in his pocket. “Yea, he’s…he’s got a day ahead of him tomorrow. I’m going to go lie down. G’night, mama.”  
  
“Good night, Sweetie Plum” Dana murmured, “…You know you can tell me if something is bothering you.”  
  
Mm, definitely not on this one. “I will, mama.”  
  
Going upstairs, he sighed when his phone rang for the tenth time. Finally picking it up, he droned, “Yaya.”  
  
“Shin” she mumbled, “…You had a beer. Are you okay? Are you safe?”  
  
“Mm. I’m at home” he assured.  
  
“You shouldn’t drink and drive, Shin.”  
  
“Or pissed off out of my mind, nope. But I did.”  
  
He closed his bedroom door, crossing the long length of the wooden floors to his king sized bed. When his parents got a new television for the living room, he inherited that big screen. Maybe some television was in order. “Shin, I would never mean to hurt you.”  
  
“I know.”  
  
“Please…just take it as I took a shot and missed. Like, very much missed.”  
  
Shin tugged his shirt over his head, replacing the phone against his ear. “There’s some American saying: you miss the shots you don’t make anyway or something. It’s a…fair assessment.”  
  
“You know, your dad had a dry sarcasm too.”  
  
Snorting, Shin climbed under his covers when he had replaced his pants with pajamas and grabbed his remote. “Well, I am my dad’s son, weren’t you saying? Just do me a favor and we can put it behind us, Yaya: move on. Find someone else. Because I can tell you this: in the zero percent chance my dad would leave my mom for you, I would never forgive him. My siblings would never forgive him. So sorry, think he’s stuck.”  
  
“I’m not stupid, Shin” she huffed, “I am not WAITING on your father; he made me resign in the effort. I’m fine on my own.”  
  
…Oh. “That seems extreme too, Yaya!”  
  
“Hopefully you don’t but you may understand one day, Shin.”  
  
“…Are you at least happy, Yaya?”  
  
“What?”  
  
“Like, a relationship isn’t necessary—it doesn’t make you. Nor do children, I guess? But…but you just don’t sound very happy.”  
  
Yaya sounded like she was cracking open another beer. Yaya’s mother and stepfather had been MIA in her life for years. Her oldest brother apparently reformed himself from being an alcoholic and worked as a fisherman somewhere so they rarely saw one another. She had nieces and nephews, they were in college now. Her half-siblings, one had overdosed on cocaine while the other was currently doing a stint in prison for homicide. If…if she didn’t have family, he hoped she had friends. At the very least, don’t be lonely.  
  
“…I better go, hon. I’ll give you a call before I fly out, okay?”  
  
“Okay. Night, Yaya.”  
  
…No. He didn’t want to understand that at all.  
  
_XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _When he tried to think back to it, it was cut up. It was erratic. It was in pieces. If he thought about it again tomorrow, exactly what was said, what had been done, the characters, it may have been entirely different. The attitudes may have been different, even. What happened, he had pieced together to what he assumed must have occurred._

_Fuck.  
  
_ I am watching the rise and fall of my salvation. There’s so much shit around me; such a lack of compassion. I thought it would be fun and games. Instead, it’s all the same. I want something to do…want to feel the sickness in you. _  
  
It was packed. Like the yard looked like they were having a concert. Somehow, somehow, liquor was flowing evenly and just when Yagami Shin thought the well was running dry, about five people showed up with five bottles each. Not to mention Nelly would run out and reup…_

_Lyla came over wearing a jean tube top dress and a pair of gladiator sandals, her hair pulled up into a ponytail. She looked good, other men glancing toward her curiously. Alas, after she finished giving her birthday wishes to the hyped twins, she came and tucked under his arm. Tonight…  
  
Or, so he may have planned. Koji and Nelly came over, high as hell, and started pouring shots. He tried to decline but Lyla picked hers up, slamming it and asking for another. Yea, that…was not how he expected this night to go. And he had responsibly assumed he would stay sober to watch Lyla but, well, he had now a hundred percent learned that that was simply impossible with Koji and Nelly Yagami. He drank…what he watched them actually compose, a simple vodka and orange juice. That was it. Vodka and orange juice. Those mischievous bastards…had mixed the orange juice with Everclear sometime last night to let the combination saturate. Next thing he knew, he was out doing the Percolator on the dance lawn._

_Shin squeezed the bridge of his nose, the ground feeling like he was in a moon bounce as he tried to find solid footing. Those damn knuckleheads. Lyla, who had gone inside to the restroom, returned to him and smiled, hugging his neck. “You feisty drunk yet?”  
  
“Oh, is that your plan?” he smirked, hugging her waist, “You want hyper slut Shin?”  
  
Laughing, she kissed him tenderly, “Maybe later.”  
  
“Well, before that happens, I want to talk to you.”  
  
She frowned and nodded slowly. He took her to a quiet spot where teenagers weren’t necking or making out. He reached into his pocket and pulled out the little box he had secured from her favorite jeweler. Lyla looked shocked, “E-Eh? Shin?”  
  
“…Look, I-I never thought we’d get like this, honest. I never thought I’d want to kiss you or…or call you ‘baby’ and sleep together, live together, but…everything has just felt really right since we have. I…I know it’s a risk your dad may marry you off—maybe, since the last two weren’t that bad—you may even like them. But I…I want you to have this. Just…just in case because I love you and I…I promised you young I’d always be there and-and I’m about to break that for a while, but…” he paused, shaking his head, “…Just…kind of always remember me.”  
  
She pouted, taking the ring and slipping it on, “…I don’t know what you mean, Yagami Shin, especially this ‘remember me’. But thank you. I…”  
  
The metal was rose gold, a perfect color he thought, curled like a vine into a rose. She stared at it before smiling wistfully, “…You’re so perfect.”  
  
“What now?” he sulked.  
  
Kissing him sweetly, she curled into his side and fell silent. He…supposed he shouldn’t expect fanfare, it wasn’t like he asked her to marry him. Just…it was more sad than he was expecting it to feel. She held his hand the whole night, when they went to get more shots, when they danced to her favorite songs, when, inevitably, he took her to his bed. It felt normal.  
_  
Until, the following almost afternoon, he woke and found the ring on her pillow.  
  
Shin stared, confused, before looking around. Maybe…she was around somewhere. Groaning, rubbing his temples, he staggered out of bed to his shower. No…not in here.  
  
He dressed, putting the ring into his pocket as he made his way downstairs. No one was down there either…walking to his porch, he smirked some to find Koji, Nelly, and Shaun outside cleaning up bottles. Figured. Walking over to Koji, he drawled, “I take it your attendees didn’t want to help?”  
  
“Psh, I had to pay my beloved siblings to help” Koji scoffed, the clatter of glass jangling, “Well, luckily everyone was holding their liquor and no vomit is around.”  
  
“With THAT mad concoction you had? That is a miracle” Shin snorted, looking around, “…You haven’t seen Lyla?”  
  
Nelly yawned, tying off a bag, “Nah. If she was here, she must have left hours ago. We’ve been out here for two and a half hours.”  
  
…What? Why…why did she leave and leave her ring? Shin slowly started to help clean up, taking his cell phone from his pocket. Calling Lyla, he frowned when it sent him to voice mail immediately. What now? Calling again, he was met with the same response.   
  
Was…was he being…dumped?  
  
The lump in his throat rose as he swept up random chip bags. No, no, maybe…maybe he was overthinking. Maybe she was busy and…and just didn’t want to draw attention to a ring. Right. Her…her dad would freak, it was like an engagement ring. Still, to…to not at least keep it when she could wear it though?  
  
“What’s wrong, Shin?”  
  
He jumped, startled, when Koji appeared, carrying one of the black plastic bags. Unbeknownst to Shin, he had gotten lost in thought, holding a Captain Morgan bottle in midair. “A-Ah, nothing. Just thinking.”  
  
About to continue about his task, Koji took the bag from him, tipping his head, “…Why don’t you go on over and check on Lyla? I doubt she’s made it back to school yet.”  
  
…Right, right, she…she probably was next door. “Okay…I’ll be right back.”  
  
The things that happened in his life, they…usually made sense to him in the grand scheme of things. Every experience led him down a different path. This one though, he…he thought about for years how he would have taken a different route, no matter how much he wasn’t sure how it occurred.   
  
When he got to the front door, he knocked as he usually would. It was rare—even rarer now for him to come here but it wasn’t like he never had. When it opened, however, the maid looked a little…alarmed. “O-Oh, Yagami-san.”  
  
“Hi. Uh, is…is Lyla home?”  
  
“O-Oh, well, she is but now is probably not a good time. I can take a message for you” she explained quickly.  
  
…What was going on? “Oh, well, yes. Tell her Shin came by, I-I was just checking on her.”  
  
“Marianne, who is there?”  
  
Shin looked up, startled. By and large, Okamoto Bajiru was not as tall as Shin’s family but tall enough. He had dark brown hair and brown eyes. He looked toward Shin before his eyes closed some. It’d been some years since Shin had encountered the man and, despite Lyla’s request to keep Shin as a friend, it…never really became cordial.  
  
“Oh. The neighbors.”  
  
…Yea? Marianne blurted, “H-He was just leaving, sir.”  
  
“Now, now, Marianne. Perhaps this is for the best. I shouldn’t trust some matters to others. If I could have just a moment of your time, Yagami-san.”  
  
…Eh? “Um, yes, sir” Shin said slowly, walking in and taking off his shoes.  
  
Bajiru led him to an office, Marianne following, “Get the ojou-san for me, please, Marianne.”  
  
“Y-Yes sir.”  
  
Bajiru took a seat behind his desk, stippling his hands together, “…I hear you decided not to attend school. You joined the army.”  
  
Oh boy. “Yes, sir. I’ll be deploying in August to Iraq.”  
  
“Shin??”  
  
He jumped a bit when Lyla appeared, her face…flabbergasted. Shin smiled slowly, “S-Sorry, I-I was just checking on you. Um, Marianne said you were busy though so I just asked her to give you a message but your father caught up with me.”  
  
Lyla blanched, her hands folding before her. What? About to question if everything was okay, Bajiru cleared his throat. “You know, Yagami-san, for…whatever you’ll be doing overseas, it takes a certain level of…maturity, as you may discover. You’ll be tasked with making some critical decisions. Adult decisions, if you will.”  
  
Shin looked to him, his brows furrowing. “…I would suspect so, sir.”  
  
“Well, my daughter, as I would suspect, was incapable of completing a very adult decision I tasked her with long ago. I would command her to do it now but I expect her spirit is too weak for such so I’ll take the burden.”  
  
The man folded his hands on the table, “It was one thing, your friendship, when you were children. Adolescence is full of flighty nonsense and frivolities. However, when my daughter came of age at sixteen, I advised her to cease communication with…adolescent frivolities.”  
  
… _What_? “I--”  
  
“It’d be one thing, Yagami-san, if your stature was of any sort of noble standing. Not even your parentage grants you any favor for me to even consider you for my daughter. But to forego even a basic education and join some nonsense where you essentially die for free? Even your presence as a companion is intolerable. Lyla comes from a strong line of affluent businessmen and, as executor of this estate, I must foresee that she marries someone with the same validity.”  
  
… “You are just a waste of time, at this point, Yagami-san. I’m sure an amusement to Lyla but very little else. You have very little to offer in the way of your career choices and even less with your bloodline. A quarterbreed begot by a half-blooded pauper and a fallen house. I think it’s about time you understood your place—and it is most certainly not in my daughter’s presence.”  
  
…A quarterbreed. Shin trembled, cutting his eyes toward Lyla. She was staring down at her feet, her hands clutched before her. Nothing, huh? He’d…he’d never let anyone say anything like this about her to him, not even his own parents. And…nothing. She said he’d…never have to prove anything to this man.  
  
…Maybe he hadn’t understood his place either.  
  
“I suppose there’s agreement on both of your behalves then” Shin managed to say, “I suppose the halfbreeds should just stay in our circle then. The amusement is done.”  
  
“In a matter of speaking.”  
  
Shin sucked his cheek before nodding, glancing to Lyla, “…Disregard then. Sorry to have wasted your time.”  
  
Turning on his heel, he went to the front foyer and knelt to put his shoes back on. Marianne scurried to the front, her face white, “S-Shin-san.”  
  
“I don’t want this. If…you can discard this for me” Shin whispered, yanking the ring from his pocket as he stood, dropping it in her hand.  
  
“Y-Yes.”  
  
His mind…was in absolute madness as he walked out the front door for what he told himself was the last time from the Okamoto estate. He walked. He actually walked up her sidewalk, not taking any shortcuts. If he took a shortcut through the jungle where they met each other, he might burn it down.   
  
Naturally, Koji Rin Yagami, the same person that suggested that woman had any sort of feelings for him and in turn made him realize he did love her, was putting the trash bags at the end of the driveway to be picked up. Looking up, he looked alarmed. He had been half right. Half. “Shin—dude, what’s wrong?”  
  
Shin stalked past him, his hands stuffed in his pockets. _“…I love you too, Shin. And I’ll….I’ll never hate you and I’ll never let you have to prove anything to my father._  
  
He stopped in the middle of the driveway and pursed his lips tight, shaking. _“I don’t know what it is you think of me, Yagami Shin, but I would never use anyone for a ‘good time’, especially you.”_  
  
Why…? _“I’ve never thought anything but how wonderful your family is, Shin. I really envy you. If I think anything about your ‘Americanness’, it’s that you and your papa have the absolute most perfect eyes.”  
  
_ Why…did she lie about _everything_? Why-why didn’t she at least _say something_?  
  
Nelly had been paying Jill and Shaun when he drew a stammered sob. He buried his face in his hands so he didn’t have to look at them. Dummy. You were going to be overseas, seeing potential death and atrocity, and here you were crying because of some…some girl? Some girl that just…just meant the world to you?  
  
“Nii-san? What’s the matter? Are you hurt?” Jill asked. He felt her get closer.  
  
“Yea, dude, what happened? You were gone like barely ten minutes” Nelly tacked on.  
  
…Fourteen years of friendship destroyed in under ten minutes. Uncovering his face, he felt the warming stickiness as he pushed past them to go dismantle everything. Pictures from the Nirvana concert, gifts from all the birthdays, that stupid charm—he’d destroy everything.  
  
Rushing up to his room, he breezed through looking for anything that even _slightly_ reminded him of her. The worn out cassettes, the band posters, the shirt from the beach—all of it had to go. How-How…

How could she not at least _say something_ _at all_?   
  
Shin ended up sitting down on his bed, staring helplessly at everything. She…was a part of _everything in his life_. Every memory had a segment of her in it. She was a staple in his existence…  
  
And she let her father call him a fucking _quarterbreed_?  
  
He would have accepted a ‘please stop’ over _nothing_. Nothing? There was nothing to react to there? That bastard called him ‘a waste of time’. _A waste of time_?   
  
Breathing in shakily, he rapidly shook his head as Koji poked his head in. No. No, this idiot. This idiot made this seem logical when he could have damn well left it all alone. Maybe he would have lost his best friend regardless but now he’d lost…  
  
His faith.  
  
Shin gritted his teeth, turning his face as Koji meandered over, his hands in the pockets of his jeans. “…What happened? What did she say?”  
  
“Nothing. She didn’t say a fucking thing.”  
  
Koji’s brows furrowed as Shin laughed, standing to grab the Red Hot Chili Pepper’s poster off his wall. Her favorite band. He never wanted to hear them again. “…Shin, you’re not making a whole lot of sense, bro.”  
  
“You know people hate us? Because-because dad’s mom got pregnant with some American’s kid and as a result we were born? Can you understand how _stupid that is_? Huh?! What do we have to do with that?! What does it matter?!” Shin snapped, throwing open his drawers to look for…anything.  
  
“Bajiru” Koji scowled. “But…that’s just _him_ , Shin, you know he’s an ass--”  
  
“He called the entirety of my relationship with her an ‘adolescent frivolity’. I don’t have stature due to what our dad is—what our mom decided she _wanted. He called our parents a half-blooded pauper and our mom fallen._ He called me a _quarterbreed waste of time._ Ask what she said for all that, Koji! Ask what she said when her dad was-was belittling me, belittling my family, and belittling my right to even be her _friend?”  
  
_ His younger brother looked startled as Shin turned, his fists bawled. “ _Nothing_. She didn’t say one. Fucking. Thing. That’s what it is, right? I was just supposed to be ‘killing time’. Her ‘get laid when she wanted it’ stud, huh? That’s what our types are good for, after all: A good fuck. That’s why she didn’t give me a damn answer on what we were, Koji: because I was just _killing time for her_. She left that ring because I overstepped who I thought I was and her dad took care of the problem for her. That’s it. That’s—that’s all this relationship meant to her when-when it meant _everything_ to me!!”  
  
Breathing in hard, he dropped on the bed. He was ready to fight Koji. He knew his younger brother had something to say to defend this. He would try to make it okay when it wasn’t—it wasn’t. None of what just happened was okay. Koji could try but…  
  
…Why wasn’t he good enough?  
  
Koji sat beside him and was silent for minutes, maybe more. Finally, the man sighed, miserable. “…Fuck Lyla too, I guess.”  
  
…He guessed…Yaya was right. Don’t get caught up in ‘circumstances’.  
  
Especially when they were all his.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
He’d die a liar if he said he was stone cold right away or didn’t cry. No, the fact of the matter was, after he made Koji take away everything she ever gave him, especially that damn pocket watch and charm, he cried quite frequently.  
  
Yagami Shin gazed off miserably from his bed, not having felt like getting up today. He formally resigned from the supermarket today, he just could not feel like it. He felt somewhat bad about it, thinking that it answered the call that he was just some spoiled kid that came in for kicks and giggles when it suited him. Ose didn’t take it that way. “Get your head on straight before you go over there, kid.”  
  
Ha. Right. This…was just perfect timing. Imagine the sort of composure and strength he needed to go to another country and possibly see suffering and violence. Imagine he needed to be at his top tier to make sure those people made it out safe and sound and didn’t have to be killed anymore. Imagine he was both the line between life and death for someone while being his own. Imagine the sort of fortitude that needed.

He was in absolute and complete shambles.

_Sheets of empty canvas; untouched sheets of clay were laid spread out before me, as her body once did… oh, all five horizons revolved around her soul, as the Earth to the sun. Now the air I tasted and breathed… has taken a turn._  
  
He tried to throw this album out. He tried. But it was…it was like the Nevermind album. It was like throwing away a part of his childhood. He literally…would have had to throw away his childhood to separate himself entirely from her memory. She…was a part…  
  
 _Ooh, and all I taught her was…everything. Ooh, I know she gave me all that she wore. And now my bitter hands chafe beneath the clouds of what was everything. All the pictures have…all been washed in black; tattooed everything…  
_  
When she held his hand at the Nirvana concert. When she was okay letting him see her in a bathing suit. Everything…was so embedded…

  
_I take a walk outside. I’m surrounded by some kids at play, yea. I can feel their laughter…so why do I sear? Ooh, and twisted thoughts that spin around my head. I’m spinning. Oh, I’m spinning. How quick the sun can drop away..._

She was so embedded…

_And now my bitter hands cradle broken glass of what was everything. All the pictures have…all been washed in black; tattooed everything. All the love gone bad turned my world to black. Tattooed all I see; All that I am; All I’ll be…  
_  
Where the fuck did he even go from here? Her? Her? His Lyla? HER? She would use him? **Her?** If SHE would confirmatively use him, what the hell would any other woman do? There was…there was no WAY after this. There was no way he could trust anyone else to be this close to him. How dare she? How dare she take that away from him? How…how dare she remove that faith from him?

How…  
  
 _I know someday you’ll have a beautiful life, I know you’ll be a sun in somebody else’s sky…_  
  


 _But why? Why…why can’t it be…can’t it be mine?_  
  
“…Good lord.”  
  
Shin languidly turned his head, not sure if anything in life could surprise him again. He wasn’t anything when he found his dad was now standing there. He looked startled for some reason. Blinking, tired, Shin mumbled, “What?”  
  
“Oh, uh, nothing. Just that was…very profound and hit _me_ in the chest so don’t know how that’s making _you_ feel right now” Yamada drawled, stuffing his hands in his pockets.  
  
Finding himself smiling, Shin murmured, “…You got your sun.”  
  
“…Maybe he meant star? There are lots of stars.”  
  
“There isn’t just one star to the Earth…”  
  
Yamada held up his hands, his blue eyes widening, “Okay, let’s not go too deep with this metaphor and, uh, turn this off. I’ll never understand you kids going to this miserable music when you’re feeling down.”  
  
“It speaks to my situation. You wouldn’t understand” Shin scoffed.  
  
His dad groaned, probably because he was being a jerk. He really was trying not to be since it wasn’t his nature but he…was just in a mood. “Sorry, dad. Really.”  
  
The doctor sat on the end of the bed, frowning, “…I just really thought, son. I just really thought that…at some point in history we’d be in a better place for this. I thought people…would come to accept that ‘pureblooded’ people aren’t superior.”  
  
Shin grimaced. Unfortunately, Koji told Nelly. Nelly had grown up but he was still like a leaking pot, the news was going to get everywhere eventually. All the gritty details got back to the family and Koji had to literally _restrain_ their mother from going over to the house to confront Bajiru. His brother groaned and said he’d been trailing her every morning for the five days since and she tried at least once or twice a day. _“No one is speaking about my husband like that and they sure as hell aren’t speaking about my babies that way either!”  
  
_ Smiling grimly, Shin sat up for the first time at 3 o’clock in the afternoon. His mom was just a different type of ‘rich girl’. She’d get by Koji and Nelly eventually and probably rip Bajiru a new one. But Bajiru didn’t even matter to Shin in this equation. His…sun burned him.  
  
“…It doesn’t matter, papa. Maybe those people will die out one day.”  
  
“…Not at this rate” Yamada muttered.  
  
The man hugged his shoulders, breathing out, “…Son, I didn’t lose a lover. End of the day, your mother is the most stable fixture in my life, even during that rocky intermission. Is she my sun? In that metaphor, of course. She’s my…entire universe.”  
  
God. “Dad--”  
  
“I have, however, lost a best friend.”  
  
…Oh. Shin’s eyes widened as his dad pulled away, looking very numb, “…Your mom, she’s my best friend but she’s also my wife. A lot of people will tell you that your spouse _should_ be your best friend. Yes, but…end of the day, when Shin died, I…I lost something that I’ve never really gotten back. Yes, I have friends—close ones, really. Ones that really have helped and been there for me. Just…Shin was there when it was all…forming. He got in trouble with me, I got in trouble with him, we were…inseparable. He was there when I…I wasn’t sure I was going to live to see the next day.”  
  
Yamada swallowed and leaned back, silent for a second before shaking his head, “…A friend, at the end of the day, shouldn’t ever look at the changes you’ve made in your life and decide to…despise you. Not when they’re choices to progress you from a life where we weren’t sure we were going to eat some days. Not…not when you realized you were in love with someone. Shin resented me for moving on and…some days I wonder if he thought of me as even a friend. God—God, he made so many decisions that hurt me. So…so damn many.”  
  
“Dad…”  
  
“But I miss him. For whatever…stupid reason, I miss him. I wish I had gotten to see him do something different with his life—I wish I had seen him even get to live it. I wish I…I hadn’t gotten to see it taken away” Yamada whispered before clearing his throat, “…Lyla was your best friend first before you saw her romantically. You…took a double hit there.”  
  
Shin flinched, quickly shaking his head, “N-No, no, dad—I mean, God, I—I’m crying over her hurting me but…God, if something _happened_ to her…”  
  
Shit, let something have happened to her like that—he might have actually killed himself, he’d be so destroyed. That was the thing, his dad wanted to commiserate with them to help his kids but it was a little hard when he and his siblings were whining over someone hurting their feelings versus _coldblooded_ _murder._ Yamada even groaned, “I-I really don’t mean to make it sound like a competition, son. Sorry, I’m not good at trying to give parallel life experiences, I guess…”  
  
“You and mom have been through some tough stuff, dad, it’s going to be difficult to come together on equal footing” Shin assured, “…I get what you’re trying to say though, I…”  
  
“I want you to mourn as much as you can now, Shin” Yamada said softly, “…Whatever is going on inside you won’t matter to your enemies. It won’t help the people that need you too. I don’t know what caused all this—but I guess I do have one more anecdote.”  
  
Jeez. “Okay…”  
  
“Your mom’s…fifteenth birthday, I believe. That was when she was just my…friend, I suppose. Or no, I guess we were starting to see each other a little differently. Anyway, I had given her some jewelry as a present and, for several days after, I…I didn’t see her. I thought I had offended her. So, I went by her family neighborhood and happened to run into her. She told me that, through some circumstances, her parents were speaking about…half-blooded people. Like me. They talked about the usual charges—lazy, mutated blood, what have you. She wanted to speak up for me but she was understandably frightened. We were a secret, her parents would have had a fit if they knew she was hanging around me. But the whole thing made her feel guilty about it, like she ought to have defended me. If she had, I probably would have never seen her again and she probably wouldn’t have even been able to go out in her life ever again, so I assured her I wouldn’t want that. I won’t excuse Lyla but…”  
  
Nineteen was a little too young to be…overly sensible. In his mind, he could excuse what his dad just told him. “Mom was like fifteen and it was before you were even romantically involved. You hadn’t promised you’d do everything in your power to take care of her if it came down to it. I made those promises to her. She…she doesn’t have the risks that mom had, she’s not getting physically abused or anything like mom was—it’s not the same.”  
  
Yamada was quiet before nodding. “…I know, son. Though, I will say this, your mother wasn’t physically abused by your grandmother until it was discovered she was pregnant with you.”  
  
…What? Shin frowned, confused, “…So…she stayed on her own to that point?”  
  
“…She’s my universe, Shin” Yamada smiled wistfully, “…She stayed to protect me.”  
  
…What? Yamada groaned when his beeper suddenly chimed. Looking at it, he grimaced, “…I’m so sorry, son. It’s times like this I regret being a surgeon.”  
  
“Don’t do that, papa. I’m glad you are. Thank you for talking to me. I promise, I’ll be all right.”  
  
His dad patted his back, “Like I said, son, take the time…my main mistake is I never took the time.”  
  
Shin looked after the man as he left, confused. His mom stayed in her maiden household to protect him? She…she was going to sacrifice herself and marry that bastard ‘stepfather’ for his dad? What…what even was the risk?   
  
…Well, the fact that he couldn’t even stomach the idea of asking his mama and the fact that same woman would probably come to blows if someone spoke ill of his dad now made it moot. He was pissed. He was…  
  
Choking, he trembled and crawled back under his covers, turning Pearl Jam back on. Maybe…one day his heart would be black too, black enough to make at least this not matter. To hell with best friends, with ‘suns’, with reasons. He needed his heart to be hard and strong for his goals, his missions, his ambitions.  
  
Right now, rather than hardened or black…it was just broken.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _“…Fuck, nii-san.”  
  
August 12th, 2000.   
  
His family, all he had, was standing in the same bus terminal where this particular journey started. This time though, he wasn’t about to be bused maybe a hundred miles away but thousands. This time, he wasn’t training, he was…he was in for the real deal. He was about to be sent off on a plane to be nowhere near his only family. This…this was it.  
  
He thankfully got to see his youngest brother’s thirteenth birthday. He even got to visit his brother’s dorms. He got to see Jill and Tony try on their high school uniforms. For that, he was so grateful.  
  
He thankfully hadn’t seen her since that day.  
  
Unlike last time, everyone was speaking to him normally in the car about random things. Shaun was talking about Pokemon, Tony and Jill were talking about the cars they wanted for their 16th birthdays—Jill wanted a red Camaro and Tony wanted a Mercedes. Their dad made a face and said he would CONSIDER the Camaro but a Mercedes was a thousand percent out of the question to which Tony was dismayed. It was comforting.  
  
Then, when they got out at the port, they all fell dead silent. Koji had said that, said ‘fuck, nii-san’. They probably all had their own version of that reaction internally: this was the real deal.  
  
Shin smiled, taking off his cover. “I’ll hopefully be able to call you immediately when I get to base. If not, I hope to be able to call you very soon.”  
  
Jill was shivering. Aww man. “P-Please be careful, nii-san. P-Please…”  
  
He hugged her tightly, kissing the top of her head. They were growing before his eyes but the youngest still weren’t completely changed. Tony bit his lip and gave him a hug next, “We’ll….we’ll see you in February, right?”  
  
“Of course” Shin assured.  
  
Shaun stared at him before giving him a hug, “…Take care, onii-san.”  
  
“You too, Shaun. Stay out of trouble now.”  
  
“Okay…”  
  
The twins were disturbingly silent. What? Shin made a face at them, “…Didn’t you make me promise you I’ll be back, Koji? Stop FINALLY overthinking it now.”  
  
“Dumbass” Koji muttered, gripping his hand and pulling him to his shoulder, “…Don’t come back a different person either.”  
  
Shin snorted, “Now you’re really asking too much. Try not to knock anyone up in college.”  
  
“Shut up…be safe, Shin.”  
  
“Mm.”  
  
Nelly scratched his chin before giving him a hug and a soft ‘take care of yourself’, pulling away to wander over to Koji. The elder twin patted his shoulder encouragingly. They’d take care of each other.  
  
Groaning, Shin slouched his shoulders to find his mama in absolute TEARS. “Mama, really?”  
  
“I-I’m okay. I’m okay” she insisted frantically, wiping her eyes, “I’m-I’m not the first mama to send her son off to war, I’m cool!”  
  
“Oh, mom, you’re going to make me cry” Shin grumbled, hugging her tightly, “I love you so much and I swear to you I will be back here in no time. I… I don’t know if I’ll be back EXACTLY for Fashion Week but--”  
  
“Just come back to me, my Sweetie Plum” Dana rasped, gripping him tightly, “I love you. Please…please be safe. Please.”  
  
Kissing her forehead, he took a long deep breath. Here goes. His dad was sucking his cheek, his jaw taut. Aw, hell. “…Sorry, I just briefly got mad at you again.”  
  
“I’m sure” Shin found himself smiling.  
  
Yamada grunted and pulled him hard into his embrace, mumbling, “…I love you so much and I swear to God above and the demons below, if you don’t come back to me in one piece, I won’t even forgive your ghost.”  
  
“Gee, thanks, dad” Shin groaned, “…I love you too, dad. I’ll see you soon, all right?”  
  
“I’m holding you to that, Shin” he barely said, kissing his forehead.  
  
The man clearly did not want to release him but it was time to board. Koji asked someone to take a picture of them with an updated Kodak camera and gave him the picture. Good, he needed a new one. Smiling, bowing, he went off to join the other soldiers on this journey to a new place on the bus and took a deep breath.  
  
Here goes.  
  
_

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 **End Notes:**  
  
The song playing at Koji and Nelly’s 18th B-Day Party is “Make Me Bad” by Korn.   
  
Shin makes the remark that he got drunk enough he started doing the Percolator on the dance ‘lawn’. If you don’t know the Percolator, it’s by Cajmere. I was 30 years old and found out there is supposed to be a dance to the Percolator…I can’t find any legit official dance but these knees ain’t about anything I saw so I missed that dang train.  
  
Black is by Pearl Jam, one of my absolute favorite songs. It’s old as dirt, yes, but God, it hits where it hits. So apparently there is some argument over if it’s “I know you’ll be a star” or is it sun…considering the imagery of the song, I think sun is the far more acceptable metaphor, like, what’s a star doing searing you, bro?  
  
Okay…so we are about to hit crazy somewhat violent and disturbing imagery territory? And we’ll discuss what sort of rules are at play here for geography and army rankings when we get back, just know it’s muddled for MY purposes. See you Sunday.


	9. A Social Experiment

**Chapter 9:** A Social Experiment  
  
Author’s Note: Yo, here’s the next chapter! Excited to finally introduce this. **Warning** : Violence and some strange sexual conversations but no actual smut. Oh no, that’s…that’s next chapter. FF.Net can’t get the full next few chapters, whoa buddy.  
  
So a few other notes: this is alternate universe, of course, and I tried to stick as closely as possible to military lingo as possible. However, literal Japan’s military isn’t quite to same as any other nation’s…so I’ve basically created my own system of rules for the story. The ranking seems off as well but meh.  
  
Also, geography! Take it with a grain of salt. While I am using actual territories or cities, there is a blend of ‘Rune Factory/Harvest Moon land’ as well. I think the world is much bigger as a whole to account for these land masses being this large…but yea, if it’s like ‘oh, there IS a city where you’re describing!’, don’t take it as it doesn’t exist or something, it’s just different…alternate universe.  
  
Enjoy!

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX _  
  
_

“Yagami, Shin!”  
  
Shin clicked together his heels, answering with the designated, ‘sir, yes, sir’. What in the hell had he gotten himself into?  
  
The flight itself was _eighteen hours_. Shin had flown a _few_ times but maybe two hours tops. He tried to sleep, he tried to read, he tried everything, but he was already anxious. He overheard some of the guys that had already made this trip talking in dismay about having to come back to August. ‘The heat, man.’  
  
Heat? Oh, yes, 34 degrees Celsius, 95 Fahrenheit, no big deal. A hot day in Japan all day. When they finally arrived after almost flying for a whole day? Well, he wasn’t sure _what_ exactly it was he walked out into. It felt like the heat literally had formed a fist and slammed it into his whole entire body and just pressed him there. He asked someone _what was the temperature_? Whomever chuckled. _“45 degrees Celsius. 112 Fahrenheit”.  
  
112 degrees_?! His _entire body started to sweat_. Drinking water as they went on to a non air-conditioned bus, he had to remind himself _not_ to be a bourgeois kid. But _112 degrees_?  
  
It never broke either, not once on the thirty minute bus ride. Shin _had_ to thank whatever kindness existed in the universe that kept him from puking like several others had. He felt it but he fought it. Damn.  
  
He wanted to sleep when they got there, a gigantic void of a space with nothing but sand on either side of it. They were only about a ten minute walk from a small city but _112 degrees._ They were already dragging as they stood in line to get linens and towels for their dorm. Aden…definitely was not on this detail. He sent word that he and his girlfriend were nearby in Baghdad so maybe he’d see them. Here, he’d be getting a new bunkmate.   
  
“Yagami, I was reading your reports.”  
  
Shin managed not to jump when acting Colonel Teramoto Ken came beside him, holding a clipboard. Shin smiled awkwardly, “Sir?”  
  
“I had an…unusual request handed down to me from above, one I, unfortunately, could not refuse. It goes against _all_ military protocol but I suppose this surpasses those conventions.”  
  
What now? “They said you’re very by the book, Yagami, so I’m assigning you this…social experiment as a bunkmate. Don’t worry, I’m sure it won’t last so just bear with it until they tucker out.”  
  
‘Social experiment’? What the hell did that mean? Shin frowned as he heard some of the rest of the unit start to sharply whisper. What?  
  
“Yamada!”  
  
Shin almost had a heart attack. The social experiment of his _dad suddenly being in the army and his bunkmate?!_ Not having one ounce of military experiment except being shot at in his hometown denied _every_ army protocol!!  
  
A young woman marched up to Colonel Teramoto. She had short messy brown hair and light brown eyes, wearing the same fatigues everyone else had on. She might have been around 5’2”, 157 centimeters. Her expression was cool and numb as she about faced, staring at Shin. Teramoto nodded, “Yagami, this is Specialist Yamada Komari. She…will be bunking with you. We had hoped to have a free room but fate didn’t call for it. Yamada, this is Private Yagami Shin.”  
  
He literally exhaled, gripping his chest, “Oh, thank _God_.”  
  
Teramoto and Yamada raised a brow, “What now?”  
  
“O-Oh, my apologies. It’s nice to meet you, Yamada-san” he bowed. “I look forward to working with you.”  
  
“…You as well, Yagami-san.”  
  
“Men, the army passed down that Specialist Yamada is going to be in our unit. She is going to be on active assignment and taking patrol with you. Should any missions occur, she will be considered _equally_ for selection. This goes without saying and is no suggestion of my troop’s character, but any untoward actions toward Specialist Yamada or _any_ officer will lead to a dishonorable discharge. Keep your normal decorum.”  
  
What? Everyone was quiet as Yamada was handed her supplies. They were assigned to room 20-01. He walked the hallway and overheard ‘lucky bastard’ as he passed. What?  
  
…Wait. Shin paused as he walked into the room, Yamada already there. The room was…sparse, to say the least. It was like literally just two cots and two metal cabinets on either side of the room. And it was a _little_ cooler but he could only imagine the kind of A/C it would take to cool off a facility like this considerably. So…six months of this, huh?  
  
Yamada stood up and her eyes narrowed. What? He frowned as she marched over and slammed the door shut. Eh? She glared daggers at him, her fists balled, “Look here, _Yagami_ , I don’t know what your relief was out there was but I’m going to set you straight _now_ : If you even _dream_ anything is gonna happen between us or you’re going to be getting ass because I’m a woman, I will rip your dick off.”  
  
“Whoa, whoa” Shin yelped, holding up his free hand, “Th-That never even crossed my mind _slightly_ , I was relieved because you’re not my dad!”  
  
She made a face, recoiling, “What?”  
  
“My-My dad’s name is Yamada, I thought they had…drafted my…dad.” Wow, Shin, blond moment much?  
  
Yamada glared, “Your last name is Yagami.”  
  
“Yea?”  
  
“So what _sense_ does that make?!” she demanded.  
  
Oh wow, it’d been a while. “Oh, my dad’s _first_ name is Yamada. Yagami Yamada.”  
  
“…What?”  
  
“Yea.”  
  
Yamada stared at him as if to deliberate if he was serious or not. Honestly, he was serious as hell but for the stupidest possible conclusion he could possibly reach. Startling him, she suddenly snickered. “…Yagami, what the fuck?”  
  
“Yea, it wasn’t one of my brighter moments” he groaned, going over to the bed Yamada hadn’t set her things on, “…But my dad also seems like the type that would do something like that if it were allowed so I freaked for a moment.”  
  
“He that resourceful?”  
  
“Uh…probably, if he set his mind to it.”  
  
Yamada sighed, picking apart her pack of sheets, “Well…I guess I wouldn’t put it past my own crazy father either. How old are you?”  
  
“Oh, uh, nineteen.”  
  
She nodded, “You’re young so I’ll let you in on a fact of life in the military: no one wants me here, Yagami. A woman has no place in men’s war games.”  
  
Shin frowned, shaking his pillow into the case, “…You’re a specialist though. What’s your specialty?”  
  
“I scored a 40 on the shooting example. I have a subspecialty in sniping” she shrugged, picking up her duffel bag and throwing it on the bed.  
  
Gawking, Shin stared, “…40? How many times?”  
  
“Hmm, I took it like eight times the first time. When I took it on my last tour of duty, I scored 40 again. They had no choice but to give me Specialist.”  
  
…Good lord. “Wow, I…I mean, I dunno about having no place in ‘men’s’ war ‘games’, Yamada, it sounds like your shooting accuracy is meant for exactly that.”  
  
“Ha! Tell that to your comrades with penises, Yagami. I was in the “women’s” unit. Non-combat, by the way. I requested to go out on a mission—begged, really. I must’ve bothered my old commander enough that he allowed it to happen. I was able to…apprehend one of the lead officials of the Zechs’ main lackeys by sniping his cell. After that? I was put right back on mail sorting duty. Important as hell, mind you. Not why I joined, however.”  
  
Shin scowled, “…So you made an ultimatum.”  
  
“Good catch, Yagami” Yamada droned, “I told them I would officially resign and that they didn’t want that. I didn’t mean anything _threatening_ by it except it’d be a mistake but they thought I had some dirt on being a woman there. It wasn’t great but nothing bad happened to me, not with my guard dog there. I asked to be put on active duty and now I’m here with your all male unit who is convinced you now have an easy lay to tap whenever your balls tighten up.”  
  
“And I assure you I will do everything in my power to indicate that is _not_ occurring” Shin sighed. “I know about it being messy to get where you want to.”  
  
Yamada raised a brow at him but nodded. They silently went about preparing the room. He unpacked his things, pasting pictures of his family on the wall over his bed. He unpacked the clothes he brought and put them in the cabinet along with the mass amount of toiletries his mom packed for him. He groaned, scratching his head. He had…avoided it but he might cut his hair. It was _short_ but he could see the practicality of a buzz cut with it being _a billion degrees_.  
  
About to go find the army barber and see his buzzed head for the first time, he noted as he was about to put his duffel bag away that it…still felt like it had something in it. Going through all the pockets _,_ it felt like a brick slammed into his heart and dragged it to his stomach. _  
  
_The pocket watch she gave him for his 16 th birthday.  
  
He stared at the metal timepiece, prepared to chuck it out the window into the sand. He carried this to basic with him. He put her picture in it. What was it doing here? Why? Did Koji think this was a fucking _joke_? He had stitched himself together to get to this point, how the fuck dare he?  
  
Trembling, he glanced down and noticed a pink piece of stationary. It was familiar. It… glaring, he snatched the letter open. _I know you hate me. But please, keep this. And be safe._ The _fucking hell_?  
  
Shivering with rage, he stared at the watch. Was…was her picture still inside?  
  
“You good there, Yagami?”  
  
Shin glanced to his side, Yamada throwing her duffel bag in the bottom drawer of a metal locker. “…Yea. Can you do me a small favor?”  
  
“Maybe?”  
  
“Can you get rid of this for me?”  
  
He tossed it low so it didn’t hit her and also because he didn’t care if it hit the ground or not. She caught it at ease, pressing the button and opening it, answering one of his questions. “Oh, she’s cute. Girlfriend?”  
  
“No.”  
  
Yamada blinked at him languidly before throwing it in a drawer. Um, he wanted her to toss it in the _garbage_. “Hey, a nuclear meltdown takes out all the clocks and compasses, we have that one.”  
  
“Well, I leave it in your capable hands. Where you from, Yamada-san?” he asked to change the subject, slumping back on his bed. Well…he wouldn’t be sleeping well for six months either.  
  
“Tsuyukusa, near Tadaoka, in the Osaka prefecture. You?”  
  
Oh, a Kansai accent, that made sense. “Born in Wasaba, raised mostly in Subami in the Hondo prefecture.”  
  
While he _hoped_ she wasn’t quite hip to what that meant, she leered, “So you’re like a hyper rich kid?”  
  
“Well…I guess. My parents worked to get there. Not a…lineage thing.”  
  
Which was apparently a problem to _some_ people. Yamada crossed her arms, staring at him, before her eyes lit up, “Yagami Yamada! The doctor dude! I thought that was a typo, we had read an article about him in high school.”  
  
“Ha, nope…that’s him though.”  
  
“Well, look, around our ‘superiors’, call me Yamada but so you don’t get the weirds about calling me by your dad’s first name, you can call me Komari” she shrugged again.  
  
Shin chuckled, “Well, I don’t make it a habit of calling my dad ‘Yamada’ but I appreciate it, Komari-san. You can call me Shin, hopefully not your dad’s name.”  
  
“Ginjiro” she droned. “So…close but not quite. C’mon, Yagami, you’re about to learn how different this is about to be from Subami. You better get ready for hell.”  
  
…What?  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _It was so fucking HOT.  
  
_ Shin miserably carried the army assigned rifle under his arm as he, Yamada, and three other soldiers trudged through the nearby town. The unit would break off into smaller groups to patrol the area full of Earthmates in order to see if the Zechs infiltrated the area. He and Yamada had been limited to this area while more seasoned soldiers were allowed to drive the Jeeps and Humvees to other locations. He’d been here a month and thus far nothing really…alarming had happened. He supposed that was the goal. He could deal with stepping stones.  
  
But it was _so fucking hot_.  
  
He didn’t even think he cursed this much, not when compared to his brothers, but there was no describing this climate without profanity. He had told Yamada his plan to buzz his hair off but she had snickered. “ _You’d look like a douche with a buzzed head, Yagami. If you MUST, maybe shave the sides so you only look like a quarter douche.”  
  
_ And he did, cutting down _some_ of the top. It was an interesting haircut to say the least, he took a picture and mailed it to his family. He wished he could see their direct reactions. He…he definitely missed them. Just…just them.  
  
Stifling a yawn, Shin glanced at the houses. Terran children were playing outside, jumping rope or playing something they had conjured up in their imaginations. How…damaging did this have to be, to see armed people walking your streets to make sure some enemy force didn’t come in to swoop them up and kill them? He…had run Louis’ scenario by Yamada to see what she thought. He expected her to scoff but she looked genuinely bemused. _“…You know, that would almost make more sense.”  
  
_ Capital. Killing people for _money_ ‘made more sense’. He shook his head as Yamada fell into step beside him, “What’cha thinking, Blue Eyes?”  
  
“That this is some bullshit the Zechs are pulling and its hot as fuck. The usual.”  
  
On top of the haircut, Shin happened to notice he was already tanned. They gave them sunscreen but it was a little difficult to reapply on the field. Sometimes he would walk around in the yard in his shorts with the other guys to _not_ get a farmer’s tan, as vain as that was.  
  
During those times, they asked if he had seen Yamada naked. He assured he wouldn’t dignify that with a response as he wasn’t _looking_ to see her naked. They heckled, said she was ‘really cute’ and that they would definitely take advantage of that situation with her. It _seriously_ had not crossed his mind. Granted, she _was_ cute but he didn’t just go around trying to sleep with people he found cute in general. That aside, her demeanor, it’d…it’d be like trying to have sex with one of his brothers.   
  
She had mentioned it a few days ago, seeming genuinely curious and suspicious. _“By now, somebody would have told me to ‘watch my mouth’ or complained that I’m too blunt, Yagami. What’s your problem?”  
  
“Komari, I literally have five other siblings and two of them, once you get them going, would probably manage to flabbergast even you.”  
  
_Yamada had been _shocked_. _“Five siblings?! So there’s like six of you?! Was there even a pullout attempt?!”  
  
_ Shin groaned, rubbing his face. Unfortunately, while he was working in Wasaba, he did hear someone suggest his dad…was not a fan of contraceptives in his youth. He just preferred to pretend they weren’t referring to _his_ father but, yea, six children definitely seemed to indicate that protection was not high on his dad’s list of concerns.  
  
Around eight in the evening, they went back to base, relieved by the next group. He needed a _shower._ While it went against everything he was trying to do and he wasn’t sure _why_ she was going along with it, Komari swayed, looking at him ‘cutely’ when he said this, in front of a good chunk of people: “You want me to wash your back, Shin-san-n-n?”  
  
“Quit it” he sulked, walking toward the shared shower room.   
  
“You’re really no fun, Yagami.”  
  
Not when it came to that, no. He took a long nice _cool_ shower because, while he loved even a warm shower in Summer at home, his skin was _over heat_. When he came out, he smirked to find Komari there with her shower bag, sitting. “Be a dear?”  
  
“Sure.”  
  
He dragged the chair over directly in front of the door. Most of the guys would go eat first before they took a shower, an order of operations Shin was _not_ able to follow, so generally Komari was good as she was of the same mindset. However, there had been _one_ incident of the guys conspiring to get a glimpse while she was bathing. Some even suggested that she should _not_ get special treatment in the first place since she wanted to be here.   
  
Colonel Teramoto was away but the next in command, an old ghost from basic training he thought he’d get to leave behind, agreed. Shin got the moves were all to try to get her to resign but seriously? He really didn’t feel _anyone_ should have to bathe in front of others if they weren’t comfortable to.   
  
“Thanks, Yagami, you’re the best.”  
  
He looked up as Komari came out with a towel around her shoulders, wearing the army official leisure clothes, patting her hair dry. Shin pushed the chair back, “No problem. Luckily no one came or I probably would have had to let them in.”  
  
“Eh, fuck it, let them” Komari uttered, “If that’s the ball they want to play, they can see these tits all day.”  
  
Shin snorted, “With some of these guys? Wouldn’t recommend. I guess I can be all awkward and block you so they’ll want to beat my ass later.”  
  
She laughed as they dropped their things off, heading for the mess hall. “You must be the oldest brother, Yagami. That or you’re a real lowkey possessive with making sure you’d be the only one seeing me naked.”  
  
“Definitely the former, Yamada” he smirked at her, “I have precisely _one_ sister and I’ve heard some very aggressive and not even moderately appropriate things suggested about her body so I might be a little extra protective.”  
  
“Aww, what a good nii-san” she joked.  
  
He snickered, grabbing a tray to get in line for this slop described as food. “I get to call you anee-san, right? Since you’re older than me.”  
  
“Oi, oi, no way, bub” Komari stuck out her tongue, “I got that enough from _actual_ kids, not some behemoth a foot taller than me.”  
  
Shin chuckled, sitting down while Komari sat across from him, picking at the food disdainfully. “You ever had turtle stew?”  
  
“…Turtles? Like…turtle-turtle?”  
  
Komari blinked languidly at him, sipping the watered down miso, “Yea, Leonardo, Raphael, Michelangelo, Donatello turtles.”  
  
“Can’t say I have nor want that pleasure” Shin cringed, spooning a bit of rice into whatever excuse for curry this was.  
  
“You suck, Yagami. It’s my favorite dish along with okonomiyaki” she leered.  
  
Drinking a sip of water, he shook his head, “I can rock with you on okonomiyaki but I’d probably freak out eating turtle. Probably just too much of a city kid.”  
  
“Well, I miss it _like hell_. I’d kill for some right now” she grumbled, miserably stirring her miso, “My old man runs a teahouse and it was one of his top dishes.”  
  
Shin smiled wistfully, “Yea, I could _really_ go for some home cooking too. My mom makes some awesome cookies…”  
  
Just…five months to go on this leg. Komari made a face, “I don’t think my mom _ever_ cooked anything. She was just terrible at it. She’s a traveling salesman and is gone all the damn time though so if I ever depended on her for food…”  
  
Frankly, as they all got older, his parents cooking for them was such a rarity. They both were excellent cooks, no doubt, but also far too busy to depend on for a daily meal. He wondered if they’d slowed down a bit now…  
  
Sometimes the universe answered suffering, especially as he was about to dip into a depression. One of the privates came around with a cart, excitably announcing that they had mail. He just…hoped.  
  
And it was delivered. Shin smiled, relieved, to receive a stack of letters and a small package. Komari also got a few letters and boxes. Flipping through, he paused. Last time…he had really been looking for…  
  
He exhaled, relieved, to only have six letters in his hands and a package from his brothers. He and Komari travelled back to their barrack and sat on their beds in silence, accepting this small piece of home in this far off place.  
  
Shin smiled softly, finding his dad definitely hadn’t gotten much better with the whole letter thing, scribbled out characters all over the place. He imagined the man started over on various pieces of paper before just settling on this one. _Hello, Son, I hope that all is well. I think about you every day and I pray this finds you in good health._  
  
Reading over it, he groaned, finding his dad spent a majority of the letter asking how _he_ was doing versus updating how _he_ was doing. Shin knew how he was doing! With a shake of his head, he leaned over and grabbed a notebook, scribbling answers to his dad and asking, ‘hey, how are YOU?’. He understood though, his dad was probably spending his free time freaking out.  
  
When he opened his mom’s next, he instantly snickered. His mama was gushing that his hair was actually cute though supremely different than what she’d always seen him with. Figures. She was a little more balanced in asking ‘how are you?’ and saying what was going on there. She reported she had opened a fifth store and she was very excited. Good, she deserved that…  
  
Koji’s was a little short in the scheme of things. He started the letter saying he would write again soon but that he was _swamped_ with classes, taking a course overload so he could potentially graduate at three or three and a half years to pursue his masters or graduate degree. Man, that kid surprised him sometimes. Nelly was talking all about parties with not even a hint of his academics in his letter…  
  
Tony talked a little about high school before talking about his ‘smoking hot’ second year girlfriend. Shin groaned again, rubbing his forehead, at some of the…gory details. He just… _prayed_ that kid understood effective protection.  
  
Adding to his response letter to Koji to _please_ make sure Tony was ‘covered’, he fearfully opened Jill’s. No, he imagined she wouldn’t be quite as candid about ‘getting blown’ as Tony was or at least about _doing_ the blowing but she may mention a boyfriend…  
  
No, Jill’s was tame. A little _too_ tame, in the scheme of things. The most rebellious thing she mentioned was she went to a rock concert _with_ Koji. She said she actually kind of liked it, joking maybe she would branch out a little. That did make him smile.  
  
Shaun, his youngest sibling, told him he wanted to buy a motorcycle just like his. Except he wanted it to be ‘Optimus Prime’ colors. ‘Old Optimus Prime’, not Beast Wars Optimus Prime. Yea, he’d been a little upset about that reboot himself. The joys of aging, he s’posed…Shaun’s letters, while bizarre, were always the most detailed and entertaining. He hoped that kid was always kind of carefree.  
  
…Swallowing, he rapidly shook his head. No, dumbass, no. That…that lineup did _not_ feel incomplete.  
  
He picked up the box and ripped it open, needing an instant distraction. What he failed to realize was it was not from his parents or younger siblings, it was from Nelly, one of the miscreants. It was a box full of porno magazines. Girl on girl porn. The five books crashed to the floor.  
  
Komari looked up and immediately at the subject of this toppling and he really would have liked to have crawled into that cursed box. She smirked. “…Interesting taste, Yagami.”  
  
“T-That’s just my stupid little brothers, playing a prank!” he blurted, his ears hot as he scooped them up, haphazardly stuffing them back into the cardboard.  
  
“Uh huh.”  
  
Kill him. Kill him now. Komari folded a letter before patting it against her lips, cutting her eyes at him. “…Well, I guess that’s a good segue.”  
  
“Um, not sure how porn is a good segue to anything but…”  
  
She laughed, waving a hand, “It’s not but I have to gloat. My baby, she just wrote and told me she’s been promoted to Specialist! If I can make this work, in May, she should be here with us.”  
  
“That’s awesome” Shin smiled, “Guess I’ll lose you as a roommate at that rate, huh?”  
  
“Possibly.”  
  
He guessed he needed to think about how he was going to rank next. He was a Private 2 and next should be Private First Class. Musing for a moment, Komari got under her covers, turning on her side and leering. Eh? “…And by ‘my baby’, I mean ‘my girlfriend’. Like, a girlfriend.”  
  
“I know, I got that intonation” Shin blinked, lying on his back.  
  
“So what, you just kind of _assumed_ I was into girls because I’m here or because I wasn’t trying to jump your bone?” she questioned dryly.  
  
Shin scoffed, rubbing his eyes, and yawning, “…When you saw my ex-friend’s picture, the way you said ‘she’s cute’ wasn’t in any of the two versions I’m acclimated to so I assumed it was an actual ‘she’s attractive to me’. I just wasn’t thinking it was anything pressing to question or whatever.”  
  
She chucked an envelope at him with a snort, “Shaddup, Yagami. You and your liberal ass responses to life. I was probably more surprised I have a girlfriend than you are.”  
  
“What’s there to judge?” he said drearily.  
  
“I guess since we’re your favorite _porn genre,_ you shouldn’t” she smirked.  
  
“What! That’s--”  
  
“What’s this about the girl from the watch being your ex?”  
  
…Bizarrely, he was actually okay with that predicament being the change of subject than the former because damn. Squeezing the bridge of his nose and closing his eyes, he mumbled, “…She _was_ my best friend. Since we were six years old, she’d been my best friend. I…When I got back from basic, things started to get a little intimate though and I mistakenly thought there was _way_ more there than there was. I…I gave her a promise ring and essentially her dad told me I was ‘a waste of time quarterbreed’ who would never be good enough for her. She…she didn’t even say anything when he said that…”  
  
Ugh, he…he still wasn’t mended. Komari’s brows furrowed, slowly shaking her head, “…Nothing?”  
  
“No.”  
  
Komari scowled, “I mean, was she the quiet type?”  
  
“Sort of but does it matter?” Shin whispered.  
  
“I mean to say, shit, Yagami, we just met and I wouldn’t let any asshole just talk to you like that, especially if it’s my pops” Komari scoffed, “Was he beating her?”  
  
Shaking his head, he sighed, “…I’d…I’d seen her naked enough to know that if he _was_ beating her, he was a master at covering bruises.”  
  
“Maybe…less surface area abuse?”  
  
He grimaced. “…It…it crossed my mind but I…I told her something once, I don’t think she would have reacted the way she did if it was a similar experience.”  
  
Komari stretched, folding her hands together to crack her knuckles, “I dunno. Has she ever defended you before?”  
  
Shin opened his mouth to deny that defense as well…but paused. Wait.  
  
“…Once, we were at a French restaurant. I mean, sometimes I get looked at as a foreigner so the waitresses are suspicious of me or something? She apparently laid the waitress out once for profiling me.”  
  
So…why? It was almost the same scenario. Komari nodded, “It’s something weird going on there with her dad, Shin. I can imagine that whole deal pissed you off but it doesn’t sound very black and white.”  
  
“…It doesn’t matter. That’s over. It’s over.”  
  
She gave him a look. Nope, had to change the subject back anyway. “What’s your girlfriend’s name?”  
  
“Itoh Kasumi. She’s a…loaded case but I love her” Komari sighed.  
  
Shin nodded, smiling some, “That’s…that’s good. It…it was a nice feeling while it lasted for me but I guess I…”  
  
…Needed to change the subject. Forever.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
‘Boredom’ was not the word he wanted to use. No, he was not bored. The area he was in had very moderate activity but, fact of the matter was, they’d had more cases of breaking up internal squabbles amongst the Terrans themselves. Nothing violent, just understandable reactions to tensions being high. And if he honestly looked at it, he preferred that. He knew that this way, the people in front of him were fortified. Yes, there were people out there in camps but these people? They were safely at home with their families where they should be, living life. He wanted to keep it that way.  
  
But it was when the day ended.   
  
Some days, he was exhausted. It didn’t matter what happened because he was going to sleep. Other days? He’d come back to base, shower, eat dinner, and send emails to his parents. It took a while but they got computers. It was…something to do.  
  
He was just alone with his thoughts so often.   
  
“Oi, oi, Yagami!”  
  
Well, not _too_ often. Shin had been standing in the courtyard, the only open point in the location aside from the exit. Joro and Saki, two guys that were in the squad along with him and Yamada, had been out with him at first, smoking. He’d _die_ before he took it back home so Koji and Nelly could heckle him but he had also started smoking a cigarette or two a day. That was it, he told himself. It was November, he would start weaning mid-December, and let it go. In all honesty, he kind of did not get it, it tasted like burning acrid grass and smoke. If he was addicted to anything about it, it was the idle motion and seeing it dwindle down.  
  
He glanced over his shoulder, currently working on his second and last stick for the day. Yamada stalked up to him and took it, taking a puff. She looked irritated, “Bitch, I heard you scored a 36 on the shooting aptitude in basic?”  
  
Shin groaned, rolling his eyes as she handed it back, “Yea, but it’s…not a 40?”  
  
“Which you scored near the _end_ of basic, apparently?”  
  
“It was a good day!”  
  
“Let’s go to the range” she leered.  
  
Great, shooting. He sighed, putting out his unfinished cancer stick into the assigned container and following Komari into the artillery area. There was a protocol to follow. While of course they were trusted to carry around guns around a foreign people, they apparently couldn’t do it willy nilly in the barracks since they may go ‘postal’. Shin was detecting some hypocrisy there but thought better to mention it.  
  
The soldier running the range gave them some 9MM and put up the sheets with a human outline, telling them to ‘go at it’. Shin sighed, putting on the goggles and ear protection, getting into position. Six shots.  
  
Granted, he wanted to fudge a little but he did end up hitting center with all six shots. Putting the gun down on the space before him, he took off his earmuffs as Komari did. The sheets charged forward toward them on the rotary so he could take it down. He turned to show it to Komari, his brows furrowed, “Again, a…good day.”  
  
Komari scoffed, “Oh, is that what you call it?”  
  
“Let’s see yours” Shin replied.  
  
With her reaction, he almost got the idea she hadn’t done that well? However, when she held up her sheet…she literally was _dead center_. It looked like she even managed to get a few of the bullets through _prior_ holes she made. “…I mean, fuck, Yamada.”  
  


Grunting, she handed her sheet over to the soldier along with her gun, taking the clipboard and signing it back in. What?? She did better than he did!

  
Alas, as they were in the hallway back to the main area, she glared, “You know how _hard_ it is to be a woman in the army, Yagami? One that wants to be active?”  
  
“Tremendously hard, I’m sure” Shin murmured.  
  
“ _All_ I have going for me, _in the power’s that be sight_ , is my weapon accuracy. I outgunned every man in my reup to get here and I get here to be roomed with _master gunman.”  
  
_ Shin shrugged, “I’ll throw my tests then.”  
  
“ _What_?”  
  
“I’ll throw my tests so they’ll overlook me” he frowned, “It’s like you said: I’ll have an easier time getting to where I want to go because I’m a man. It’s not fair so I need to level the playing field.”  
  
He yelped when she punched his hip, “ _Yagami._ That is not _helping_ , that’s _padding_. We shoot the _exact_ same, we should be considered _equally_ without you having to come down to the level they think _I_ should be at.”  
  
…Ooh. Shin winced, “…You’re…you’re right. Sorry.”  
  
“No, because that’s what it’s taken to get this far: someone having to buckle under so we ‘have a chance’. Well, whatever, keep doing your thing. I’ll do mine” Yamada muttered.  
  
Shin shook his head, “I’ve got your back whether you like it or not, Komari. None of us are winning if one of us is being forced to struggle harder.”  
  
“That what your daddy tell you?”  
  
With a grin, Shin pushed the door open to the rec room, “No. I’m pretty sure my dad got to where he was saying ‘fuck all of you’.”  
  
Komari laughed, “Sounds like my kind of guy. What happened to you?”  
  
He sighed, finding most activities in the room fully occupied so he sat on the beaten old couch, “…I met one guy, right? One that my dad grew up with in the old hood. Guy was just…pissed that my dad managed to get out. Told me if it wasn’t for my ‘rich cunt mom’, we’d have never made it out, basically.”  
  
“Um, and you whooped his ass, right?” Komari demanded, sitting on the other end.  
  
“Well, I punched him, but, that was the type of people my dad was surrounded by. Hell, even the guy he named me after sounds like he was a weight to his ambitions but he calls him his ‘best friend’. My dad’s MOM, my grandmother, she kicked him out for it too. I just can’t…imagine how lonely it was to have so few people wanting to see him succeed, to help him—really, to even believe in him. I…I guess knowing all that, while I completely grasp why _he_ had to say ‘fuck all of you’, even when he didn’t want to, I don’t want to be one of those people like the ones that held him back.”  
  


She frowned, staring at him, before nodding, “I gotcha. That makes sense.”  
  
Before he could question what her goal was, quite randomly, a few soldiers came in, cheering, with a crate. What? It was stamped ‘Budweiser’. “The brewery sent us a ‘thanks for your service’ gift!”  
  
Wow, really? Shin smirked as he was handed two in all the shenanigans that ensued. Komari snickered when she was handed _four_. “Men think they’re slick. Wanna make sure I’m nice and wasted.”  
  
There was literally few things on Earth worse than a warm beer, Shin thought begrudgingly, but ice nor access to the fridge was a commodity here. “Maybe it’d help if you told them you don’t care for penis.”  
  
Komari kicked him, laughing, “You don’t know _what_ I ‘care for’, Yagami, thank you _very much_. However, given _your_ fetishization of a sexuality, I would think you’d understand that’d make things worse.”  
  
Shin groaned, sipping the beer, “Have you ever looked at straight porn?”  
  
“Of course.”  
  
“Yea, well, I got sick of having to weed out the stuff where I needed to root for a winner while the dicked individual tries to _murder their partner_. I started to feel like I was watching the damn Terminator.”  
  
She laughed more, “You’re so damn stupid, Shin, but you’re right: it’s like watching a torture session even when it’s not bondage.”  
  
“Exactly” Shin groaned, “Women tend to be a lot more…understanding that the vagina is attached to someone’s body.”  
  
Komari winked, “Some girls do like it rough though, Yagami.”  
  
“I don’t like lezdom either…”  
  
Snickering, Komari shook her head, “You know, I was really worried what I’d have to put up with while I was here. Turns out the universe blessed me with your random ass. I _guess_ if it comes down to it, I wouldn’t mind if you end up in leadership one day.”  
  
Shin scoffed, “…Leadership. You know _I_ have some hurdles too, correct?”  
  
“Ah, yes, nationalistic bullshit that says your ‘impure’ blood will shame us all” Komari grunted, “Just bullshit, Yagami. Here we are at the top of our game and _we’re_ second best because of things that don’t matter in the slightest.”  
  
“Yep. Racism or sexism…”  
  
She held out her beer, smiling, “Either we both make it or we both fall.”  
  
…Yes. Shin tapped his beer to hers, nodding in agreement.   
  
He was really glad the universe put her there. Like, extremely, even to this day. The fact of the matter was, Yagami Shin had four brothers and a sister and…once upon a time, a best friend. The lonely moments at that time would have eaten him up before ambitions could have ever been realized. Yamada Komari would always be special to him.  
  
He never would have made it without her.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
“You hear anything last night, Yagami?”  
  
Shin honestly wasn’t sure…what to make of this. They had a ‘leave time’ for the day and tomorrow to ‘relax’. What? They got time to _relax_? What was this? Apparently, Aden and Sonja _also_ had ‘leave time’ today and had called to ask if he wanted to go to a nightclub in Baghdad. Oh…okay.  
  
He…was glad he had packed normal slightly fancier clothes? He had assumed he was wasting space packing the white silk shirt and jeans along with the dress boots but, well, here he was. Staring at his feet in something other than steel toes as he sat in a chair outside of his room, he shook his head, “Like what, Yamada?”  
  
Naturally, he invited his roommate. She looked _thrilled_ because, well, it was December and they hadn’t been _anywhere_ except the town they surveilled. She kicked him out of the room to get dressed almost immediately. Okay. She was different.  
  
“Like I was fingering the _fuck_ out of my pussy last night, I just knew you’d wake up!”  
  
Shin’s brows drooped as he pursed his lips, shaking his head. _Very_ different. “Komari.”  
  
“Hey, your brothers actually have quality taste in lesbian porn. Kudos” she said, opening the door.  
  
Glancing to her, about to retort, he paused. He…wasn’t actually sure what he thought she’d wear but he wasn’t expecting the golden yellow spaghetti strap dress with brown boots. Putting on a red leather coat because it had _slightly_ cooled down, she tipped her head, “C’mon before we miss the transport.”  
  
“Ah, yea.”  
  
Standing, he followed her to the outside of the base. They showed all of their military IDs and signed themselves out, running for the bus that a number of their other comrades were already on. Shin groaned as almost everyone’s attention came front and center for their only girl. She was unbothered as she slammed down on the front seat by the window. He sat beside her, stretching his arm out across the back of the seat because Handsy-san, one of their personal space deficient comrades, was right behind her. “Asshole, Yagami” muttered Handsy-san.  
  
“Hmmm? What was that?” Shin sang, glancing over his shoulder and pinning him with a glare.  
  
“N-Nothing.”  
  
“You must be some crazy ass protective brother, Yagami” Komari smirked.  
  
Shin shrugged, “I’m like third tier compared to the others.”  
  
“Jesus.”  
  
With a chuckle, he closed his eyes as the driver started to take them to Baghdad. Honestly, it probably wasn’t a great idea. Should something happen like a landmine, it’d take out at least a fourth of their troops right here. But they rode along in peace and were dropped off at 7 in the city. It was way more bustling than the area they were in, really. Komari strode beside them as he asked a shopkeeper in his spotty Arabic where ‘Aljuza’ was.   
  
“You’re kind of a savant, Shin.”  
  
He frowned at that as they walked up the road with the directive that it would be lit up the brightest with a set of Arabic symbols the guy wrote down for him. _‘Most of you don’t take the time’_ the guy had said. Well, he didn’t want to be in another country with _no_ concept of the language. “I mean, imagine we don’t even have enough of a hold to ask how to get to a basic place. It’s not smart.”  
  
“I’m not smart” sighed Komari, crossing her arms, “…But you’re right. I’ll work on it. Fuck you, Yagami, always a step ahead.”  
  
Smirking at her, he sighed dramatically, “Oh, you’d be cute if you weren’t so rude…”  
  
He laughed as she swung at him, dodging, “I’ll show you ‘rude’, prick--”  
  
“Yagami!”  
  
Shin started, surprised by the voice. Looking up, he smiled and waved, “Aden!”  
  
The white haired fellow was standing next to his pink haired girlfriend who was chatting with another young woman. Oh…wait, based on what Komari said, what…what was Sonja doing? Aden grinned, gripping Shin’s hand, “How you holding up out there, man? You’re right caramel right now.”  
  
“The hell are _you_ doing that you’re not?” Shin demanded.  
  
“Driving the armored tanker prototype they got going” Aden sighed, “It’s kind of fun, kind of not.”  
  
Weird. “Lucky jerk. Hey, Yamada, this is my buddy from basic, Aden Bjerke. Aden, this is my roommate, Yamada Komari” Shin introduced.  
  
“Nice to meetcha” Komari nodded.  
  
“Oh, uh, same. You’re…his roommate?” Aden questioned, clearly confused.  
  
Apparently this was enough to catch Sonja’s attention too, coming over with her friend, a short blonde woman. Shin sighed, “Komari is in active duty with me. We’re both doing surveillance in a Terran village near Mosul. The coed situation is…unique.”  
  
“Wow, that’s intense” Sonja gasped, “I’m Sonja Piehl. I’m in communications and translation right now. This is my friend, Elena.”  
  
Elena nodded, “I’m a mechanic in the 5th.”  
  
Komari looked startled, “Really? Thought that was another job dudes held down religiously.”  
  
“Hey, when you’ve got it, they won’t deny you in a pinch” Elena shrugged.  
  
Sonja nodded her head, “Elena’s one of the best, definitely.”  
  
“Yeesh, Yagami, sounds like we’re in a less progressive squad” Komari droned.  
  
Hmm, maybe. Shin felt…lost being in an establishment like this again. It was a little different though, the music was in Arabic and a lot of people were crowded around tables with…a lamp? Raising a brow as Aden ordered a ‘double apple shisha’, Shin drawled, “…Which is…?”  
  
“Probably nothing your straight edge ass will want to do” Aden teased.  
  
Komari snorted, seated beside him in the metal chair, “Mister ‘Smoke Three Cigarettes A Day’ here?”  
  
“My God, dude, what happened?” Aden gawked.  
  
Shin lightly leered at Komari who just smirked. “…I’m going to quit. I just need to wean.”  
  
“We’re in stressful times and a situation that could potentially kill us anyway, why bother?” Komari questioned.  
  
Groaning, Shin rubbed his face, “Because I have two brothers back home that I’ve given hell for smoking and the last thing I need to come back with is the habit I’ve rebuked them for. Not to mention, my mom and dad would probably have a _fit_.”  
  
“It’s not a great habit” Aden agreed.  
  
Komari grinned devilishly. He seriously wondered if she was loosely related to any of them given she was like a version of Koji. “Well, Yagami here is probably more stressed than anybody there. His brothers send him a boatload of lesbian porn and he gives it away without even the chance to beat off.”  
  
“Aww, he did that in basic too” laughed Aden.  
  
“I hate both of you.”  
  
Giggling, Komari pat his head, “Don’t worry, two more months and we can both get laid.”  
  
Shin scoffed loudly. Yea, right. Never again, at this rate. Sonja smirked at Aden who cut his eyes lightly at her, drawling, “It would be _nice_ to get laid again…”  
  
“Oh, I thought you took care of that with Evelyn” Sonja mused.  
  
…Eh? Shin’s eyes widened as Aden rolled his, sighing, “U-Uh, you two good?”  
  
“We’re in one of our ‘off’ stages right now” Aden informed, “We’re always either on or off. Mind, I slept with Evelyn, one of our unit members, while we were _off_ but she isn’t too happy about it.”  
  
“You know how much Guy likes her!” Sonja snapped.  
  
Aden threw his hands up, “It was _just_ oral!”  
  
Sonja simply rolled her eyes as well. What…? “W-Well, gee, that must be awkward” Shin offered, uncertain what else to add.  
  
“You’d still fuck him, I’m sure” Komari said with that landmark bluntness, just to a _perfect stranger_.  
  
Shockingly, Sonja nodded, “Well, of course. But he’s not getting the goods right now.”  
  
Wait a minute, _what_? “…While you’re _broken up_?” Shin demanded.  
  
“The dick you know is better than the dick you don’t” Sonja said, strangely matter of fact.  
  
And _Komari_ nodded in agreement so he could give her a look. Oh _really_? One of the waiters returned with…the lamp with hoses, apparently called a ‘hookah’ and lit something on the top. Aden showed him the process of apparently sucking smoke out of some magical place and exhaling. Well…it sure made him dizzy.  
  
“Hey, Shin, Yamada-san, we’ll be right back, we see one of our lieutenants” Aden said, tipping his head.   
  
Shin nodded, drinking a glass of ‘arak’, a very…interesting alcohol. He didn’t expect to feature a different culture so this was kind of neat. Komari suddenly grimaced, quickly turning so her body was facing more toward him. Frowning, Shin looked up, “What’s the matter?”  
  
“Ten o’clock.”  
  
Shooting his gaze in that direction, he spotted a guy looking over, seeming…forlorn. What? He definitely wasn’t a local, he possibly was Japanese, with long black hair. “What about him? He bothering you?”  
  
“Shut up” she said under her breath, “…His name is Mako. His dad, _also_ Mako, and my dad were good friends back in Tsuyukasa. We grew up together.”  
  
“Oh…guess you had a falling out?”  
  
“You…could call it that?”  
  
“A-Ah, Komari?”  
  
Shin looked up as Komari froze, the man in question apparently having garnered the courage to approach. She smiled brightly, turned back, “A-Ah, hello, Mako! How are you? Papa had said your dad was fussing over you deploying.”  
  
“Oh, uh, I’m-I’m doing well” he smiled some, “You, uh, you look good. It’s weird to see you without Itoh-san though.”  
  
“Y-Yea” she laughed, “Uh, I-I made a kind of crazy move and went to a generally all men’s barrack so I can serve in active combat. N-Not that we’ve seen any but definitely not mail duty where she is.”  
  
Mako frowned, “Oh, wow, that’s intense. Uh, she didn’t take it well, I’m sure.”  
  
“Nope, not at all” Komari grinned nervously, clapping her hands together silently.  
  
Finally, Mako raised a brow at him, “So I guess this is, uh, one of your unit?”  
  
Shin was about to introduce himself but Komari actually grabbed his hand, “Yes! This is my buddy, Yagami! Yagami, this is Mako! I was telling you about Mako.”  
  
“Ah, yes…” Shin drawled, puzzled, “It’s a pleasure. She was saying you’re from her hometown.”  
  
And you’re also making her act like a spaz so please leave. Mako nodded, “Yea, we, uh, grew up together.”  
  
…He guessed down the line if he ever became numbed instead of bitterly enraged with her, this would be the type of interaction he’d have with Lyla. Swallowing hard, he nodded once and picked up his drink again. Komari nodded her head quickly, “So, hey, when-when do you go home on break, Mako-san?”  
  
“Oh, not until June” he sighed.  
  
“Dang, I’ll miss you then…um, but when we’re both back from active deployment, let’s get a drink, okay? It’s just a bit too noisy in here to catch up and we have to be heading back to base soon.”  
  
Shin could read an excuse a mile away but Mako looked…relieved? “That sounds great, Komari…uh, nice meeting you, Yagami-san. You both stay safe.”  
  
“You too, Mako-san.”  
  
Smiling with another nod as Mako bowed, Shin drawled as the man walked away, “It wasn’t _quite_ kick myself in the face awkward but it was pretty close…”  
  
Komari just groaned, turning in to face him again, flustered. What? It was a random dude she grew up with. Shin turned inward too, blinking, “What’s the dirt?”  
  
“Dirt?! There’s no dirt!” she squeaked.  
  
“Sand then.”  
  
“Shaddap, Yagami” she muttered, smacking his arm, “…I guess I trust you.”  
  
“Thanks.”  
  
“But it stays between us” she hissed, “Because it’ll be _more_ of a nightmare for me if it gets out.”  
  
Shin’s brows furrowed but he nodded, getting closer to limit this possibility. She flustered, crossing her arms, “…L-Look, you’re a straight guy so I’m not sure how…up to date you are on the spectrum of sexualities.”  
  
“I’d like to learn” he offered, a bit confused. Spectrum?  
  
“…In high school and middle school, I dated a girl named Suzuki. When we broke up…I dated a guy named Hina.”  
  
… _Oh_. Shin nodded slowly, “…Was it just curiosity or pressure or…?”  
  
“Or. I liked messing around with Hina as much as I liked messing around with Suzu. I’m bisexual” she mumbled.   
  
Oh! “…Oh, so you were with Mako too at some point” he nodded, enlightened.  
  
“Um…not quite like you’re describing.”  
  
What? Shin blinked languidly as she managed to get redder. “…Elaborate?”  
  
“Kasumi is…is I guess kind of like your girl, Lyla? Like, we’ve known each other since we were eight and we’re best friends. Just, one day, she came out to me when we were seventeen and said she loved only me, so, it made sense to me for us to get together? And I _adore_ Kasumi, I would die for her. I love her and I _will_ marry her. Just…”  
  
It hurt to hear devotion like he once had. It kind of was cloying to hear a ‘just’. “Just…?”  
  
“…I won’t elaborate on _her_ story, Yagami. She’s not bisexual, she identifies strictly as a lesbian. Due to her background, she…absolutely hates men. Like, doesn’t tolerate them whatsoever. She doesn’t even acknowledge my dad.”  
  
What now? “That’s…kind of critical there, Yamada, that’s your dad and I haven’t heard you say you’re on bad terms with him” Shin gaped.  
  
“I LOVE that doofus” she groaned, “That’s _my_ papa. But…not like that for her, okay? It’s…it’s a dark story and she’s not without her reasons.”  
  
“…Understood” he murmured. Sounded like…Koji territory.  
  
“ _But_ she’s hella jealous and probably mildly psychotic” she laughed nervously.  
  
…Mmkay. Shin stared as she twiddled her fingers, “…She doesn’t seem to understand _I_ have no problem with men? I guess she assumed when I agreed to be her girlfriend, I was supposed to call all of that off because-e-e I’m bisexual and that means I have a chance to leave her for a guy which would cause her to go crazy?”  
  
Shin glared, “Komari, that’s not right. That means she doesn’t even trust _you_ not to screw around on her. Jealousy is not healthy in that respect.”  
  
She groaned as Shin grumbled, “Look, I also won’t reveal too much but I have a relative that went through some dark stuff _very_ young and let’s just say none of it was even resolved or spoken of, he…he didn’t even get therapy so he’s got a _lot_ of inner demons he is consistently fighting. He may cave to them sometimes but he knows that he shouldn’t push that back on other people.”  
  
“I let it get…bad” she said glumly, “I didn’t mind when she said ‘don’t look at that guy you used to have a crush on’ or whatever because I was loyal to her. It’s just when it extended to _Mako_ and Hina…people we’ve grown up with. Some people I’ve not had one sexual feeling for!”  
  
“That’s not healthy, Yamada…”  
  
Komari rubbed her brow as Shin sighed, “So Mako is awkward because you cut ties with him after she told you to.”  
  
“…Uh, not exactly. There’s still…more sand.”  
  
Oh boy. “So, I actually put my…foot down on Hina and Mako. Like, I’d known them _longer_ than her? Well, in her…unhealthy behavior, she decided to fix that by making me…prove I’m not quite into them?”  
  
... “I…pardon?”  
  
“Yea, so…might be a weird kink of hers but she definitely has watched me have sex with about six guys now.”  
  
Shin legitimately had heard some very strange things in his lifetime. Sometimes they left him speechless or just mind blown. He didn’t want to reflect on the last occurrence where such happened but, honestly? This challenged the very fabric of his understanding of life because it was being ripped asunder.  
  
He folded his hands, leaning back and gnawing his lip because all of his processes were trying to formulate how to put what was just told to him back together. “…Okay.”  
  
“Yea.”  
  
“…She hates men.”  
  
“Yes.”  
  
“She wants you to stay away from men because you _can_ be attracted to men, though you are monogamous to her.”  
  
“Yes.”  
  
“Because you flexed your freedom to know who you want, male or not…her response to this is…to watch you…get fucked by men.”  
  
“…Yea.”

  
Nope, the threads were still ripping like wet paper. Shin rubbed his face, not sure…where to even start. “…Why?”  
  
“Because, if I _respond_ to their…actions, it must mean that I am attracted to them, thus justifying her concerns and confirming why I don’t need to communicate with them anymore.”  
  
Shin was getting…very aggravated. “And what…are we talking about with _responding_ , Komari? Are we talking…orgasming?”  
  
“Yea?”  
  
Throwing his hands up, he had to pause to remember to keep his voice down. “Komari. Komari—a man’s _prostate_ being stimulated can make them ejaculate but that doesn’t mean they like anal sex. Victims of rape can still _involuntarily_ orgasm because the body is going to do what it _wants_ and you can’t tell it _not_ to do something.”  
  
Komari looked startled. Maybe just the ‘perks’ of being a doctor’s kid. “…Wha?”  
  
“Your body is going to react regardless, Komari. That is a _piss poor_ ‘test’.”  
  
Hesitant, Komari shrugged, “W-Well, I don’t? I-I mean, to be perfectly _fair,_ the guy is hella freaked out and I don’t…think they’re in top tier performance mode because it’s so awkward.”  
  
No kidding. Shin took a breath, “…Don’t take this the wrong way, Komari, but…is this _terrible invasion of autonomy_ at least…consensual? Like, she’s not _pressuring_ you to have sex with men, right?”  
  
She blushed, muttering, “T-The first time, it…it might have been a little forced and coerced but…”  
  
Shin nodded, “It became a turn on.”  
  
“Is that weird?” she sighed deeply, “I mean, I know people have some _wild_ fetishes. I just didn’t think I would be turned on by my girlfriend watching me get pounded. Also, her…flex of dominance is to ‘finish the job’ the guys couldn’t to prove only she satisfies me. So, it’s a rare game we play but it is something we do and…that’s what happened with Mako. He was that first incident.”  
  
…Way uncomfortable. He shook his head. “…Why do the dudes in this equation even _agree_?”  
  
“Really, Yagami? Look, _you_ might be a saint, but a lot of guys aren’t turning down free pussy, man.”  
  
‘Free pussy’? “You’re their _childhood friend_!”  
  
…Oops. He was one to fucking talk. Komari rubbed her arm before nodding softly, “…They were…slightly coerced too, I have to admit. She’s a very assertive and persistent person. She’ll talk you into a corner. I can’t excuse it but I would say only one third of the guys were there for ‘free pussy’…”  
  
“I don’t like this, Komari. It’s not…it’s not _healthy_. Imagine if this was a man telling his girlfriend he didn’t trust her and making her have sex with a guy.”  
  
“Cuckolding, right?” she smirked some, picking up her drink.  
  
“…That can’t be real” Shin glowered.  
  
“Congratulations to me, I guess, just x’d out another porn genre” she said sarcastically.  
  
Pouring himself some more arak, he looked up as the rest of their party started to return. “Well, I’m putting it out there now: if she _does_ join us on the second leg of our deployment, I will _not_ be having sex with you to prove you’re not into me or make it so awkward I won’t associate with you.”  
  
“We both better hope it doesn’t come to that because that monster cock you have might kill me” she muttered to herself.  
  
Shin stared at her through half open lids, slowly shaking his head, “…Just real different, Yamada.”  
  
“What! It _is_ , I saw it when we were in the shower!”  
  
“Uh…what?” Aden said, having gotten close enough in the last leg.  
  
…Ugh. What…what nonsense. Relationships like that were…were not good. Meanwhile, Aden and Sonja were just having casual sex while on break up number five because she ‘knew’ where his dick was _usually_.   
  
…A lot of things were very different and he wanted no part of that.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _“…Merry Christmas, everyone.”  
  
Yagami Shin sat by the phone, forcing a smile so his tone might match it. This…was his first Christmas away from his family.  
  
Most of the others called their girlfriends. The rest didn’t see the significance. It made sense, it wasn’t a big deal in Japan. Just, to his family, it had been made into a big deal. And they were usually together.   
  
Some of the American and European recruits were in the room, thankfully also seeming caught up in the bittersweet reality that all they had was this phone call today. Misery loved company.  
  
“Don’t worry, nii-san, we have all your presents here waiting for you when you get back” Shaun said optimistically.  
  
Presents…he didn’t really care about stuff right now. “Thanks, Shaun.”  
  
“Are you getting enough to eat, son? You sound tired, are you sleeping enough to be alert?” Yamada questioned, a lowkey franticness in his voice.  
  
“I sleep fine, dad. And the food…the food could be better but I’m eating it.” They had natto today. Natto.  
  
Dana whined, “My poor Sweetie Plum.”  
  
“Well, hold tough, bro. You’ll be home soon” Koji reassured.  
  
“Yea, just two months, nii-san!” Jill proclaimed.  
  
Two months. “Yea. I, uh, I have to go, it’s someone else’s turn” he mumbled as the phone started to chime that time was almost up.   
  
“Okay, son. Please, keep…keep being safe. We love you” Yamada murmured.   
  
“I love you all too. G’night.”  
  
Hanging up, he shuffled out of the room to his barracks. Komari was stretched out on her cot before looking up with a grin, “Ay, Yagami! Look what I got!”  
  
Shin raised a brow as she leaned over to get under the bed, pulling out… “Sake? Where’d you get that?”  
  
“I have my ways” she winked, pouring it into a plastic cup.  
  
God, now they were drinking damn cold sake, he groaned as she handed him one. “Thanks, Yamada.”  
  
“Aww, what’s wrong?” she questioned.  
  
“…It’s nothing. My family celebrates Christmas the…American way so I just feel a little homesick, I guess” he shrugged.  
  
He expected the Baroness of Bluntness to heckle him but she nodded, “We would go to the Inari Temple on Christmas and eat mochi buns. My dad always gets me a new headband to makes me more ladylikes.”  
  
Shin couldn’t help grin, “Oh yea? How’d that go?”  
  
“Dunno, guess it worked in reverse, I likes ladies.”  
  
“You’re terrible” he snickered, shaking his head, “Does your dad have a problem with your sexuality? I heard a lot of parents can be very dismissive.”  
  
Komari shook her head, lying on her side, her cheek propped in her palm, “Nah. My mom was a little put off she might not have grandkids but that’s about all. And even then, it’s not like I’m against having a sperm donor, y’know?”  
  
“There are ways” he agreed.  
  
“How about it, Yagami? Wanna be my baby daddy?”  
  
“Ab-solutely not.”  
  
_

 _Komari laughed because she was crazy. He smiled and shook his head, “…Thanks for being here, Yamada. You’ve been a wild ride since day one in this ‘experiment’ but it wouldn’t be the same without you. I…I’m not used to being by myself.”  
  
She looked puzzled, “I mean, even if I wasn’t here, you’d have all the other guys here.”  
  
“Yea, but…” Shin paused before groaning, “…When I think about it, I only have a handful of close guy friends. Aden was a blessing, a cool guy, but you heard about that craziness with his girlfriend. I bet he wouldn’t even be here half the time.”  
  
“…It is a little scary being by yourself. I already told you I was blessed to have your random ass on the other end of this equation. But stop getting all sappy before I start to think you’re hitting on me.”  
  
Shin stuck out his tongue, “I’m not hitting on you…thank you for being my friend, Komari.”  
  
“You too, Shin.”  
  
_January 31st, 2001.  
  
Yagami Shin smiled when a little girl in the little Terran village handed him a blue flower, murmuring ‘thank you’ in Arabic to her. She giggled and ran off as he tucked it away in the side pocket of his bag. Yamada Komari snickered, “The girls just love you, huh?”  
  
He snorted and Saki laughed, his rifle under his arm. “Must be, they don’t give _me_ flowers.”  
  
“You have the face of a mule, Saki. Yagami’s got the face of an angel” Joro joked.  
  
“Shaddap” Shin leered as Komari laughed.  
  
The funny thing was, he hadn’t caught not sight nor hair of one Zechian soldier and he was about to go home on sabbatical in two weeks. He’d been here six months and not seen one of them. Again, he was okay with that, it meant they were scaring them off.  
  
He thought.  
  
Shin had been looking at the Captain, Sugo, absently as he talked about what might be for dinner when suddenly blood jerked out of his chest. What?  
  
“Yagami!!” Yamada screamed.  
  
Fuck.   
  
Shin quickly grabbed Sugo, the adrenaline in his blood making carrying the almost two hundred pound man easier, and rushed to the shelter of a stone building. Terrans were screaming as they rushed to safety. Why _now_?? Shin swallowed, looking down at the guy who just took a bullet to the chest. He was shaking. “Y-Yagami.”  
  
“Hey, sir, j-just keep still.”  
  
“Yagami!”  
  
Komari came behind him as he quickly tried to patch the wounds. Joro and Saki came next and thankfully their bus to get Sugo back to base for treatment. Shin quickly shot a look to Komari and she nodded. Okay. He shakily checked around the corner and found the shot’s trajectory via where Sugo’s blood trail began.  
  
“…He was shot square in the chest so it came from that building” Shin concluded, pointing to a community housing in front of them.  
  
Joro was shaking as Komari grabbed a case and unloaded a sniper rifle. She peered through the scope, silent for a minute before muttering, “…Looks like he’s the watchman. I can take him but he’s got an open shot for me too. I don’t know the range on his weapon.”  
  
She glared toward him before smiling, strained, “Here’s our moment, Yagami.”  
  
“…I got you, Yamada.”  
  
He counted to three, feeling the emotions of his dad _strangling him_ for this split decision as he darted out into the open. He could see the man mounting up to shoot him…before a bullet ripped through his skull.   
  
Shin exhaled shakily as Komari, Joro, and Saki rushed to him. She looked _pissed_. “You motherfucker, I didn’t mean ‘go play fucking _bait’_!!”  
  
Oops. “W-Well, it worked. Let’s go in.”  
  
“They’re phoning for reinforcements though, Yagami” Joro rasped.  
  
“There’s-there’s an escape route in the back. All it will take is ten minutes for them to disappear and take the Terrans with them.”  
  
Shin saw Joro, Saki, and the four other combat members looked terrified. Yea, their first violent encounter _five months_ into being here. Sugo was the _captain,_ of _course_. “Uh, you’re…you’re next in rank, Yamada, what do you think we should do?”  
  
Komari jumped, startled by this revelation before squinting, “…I’ll take _crazy ass here_ and we’ll go scout the inside.”  
  
“E-Eh? B-but, we can’t let you guys go alone!” protested Saki.  
  
Joro almost looked like ‘why not?’. Shin tipped his head, “Why don’t Joro and Saki act as suppressing fire while we lead front and center? The rest of the unit can divide equally and protect the entrance and the back door. No one needs to get in and the only ones we want going out are Terrans.”  
  
“You heard the man. Create a bulletproof blockade on entry and back exit. Run it Spartan, back to back. Understood?” Komari bellowed.  
  
‘Sir, yes, sir’ went around and Shin took a deep breath. This…was it. Sink or swim.  
  
Joro was on his left side as he and Komari framed the door. The poor guy was shaking and, really, it was only a miracle that Shin wasn’t. His nerves were already shot. Alas… “Relax, Joro. I-I have all of your backs.”  
  
His comrade just looked at him, petrified, as Shin slowly reached for the door. Looking to Komari for the signal, she nodded once.   
  
…Don’t let this be it.  
  
Shoving it open, he peeked to draw enemy fire. None. Komari gave a slightly longer peek and still nothing. He scowled, “…Ambush.”  
  
“Mm.”  
  
There were a row of doors on either side of the hallway leading to some steps, there could be Zechians in any one of these rooms ready to pop out. Shin glanced to Komari, “…We open the first ones, we go check the next? Joro and Saki check the first rooms.”  
  
“E-Eh? But--” Joro blurted.  
  
“They most likely won’t be in the first rooms, else we could have sniped them. Check the rooms for civilians and get them out” Komari whispered.  
  
Joro and Saki looked startled as Shin nodded. Walking in slowly, crouching, Shin slowly pushed the left door open while Komari hit the right, Joro and Saki going into both. Shin took a breath of relief, hearing the two quietly whisper to the inhabitants to go outside to their blockade. Pushing the second door open, Shin checked the corner. Inside was a woman huddled with her children, shaking. Tapping the doorway lightly to hopefully get her attention, the woman yelped. He signaled her to stay quiet and tapped his eye, hoping she understood. The woman rapidly shook her head and he beckoned her. Okay…  
  
The woman rushed out with her children, an older man coming out of Komari’s. They went down the entire row and found only civilians. Joro looked confused, “…They went past the bottom to get to the top?”  
  
“They must have rappelled to the roof and planned to take them from the top floor down” Shin mused.  
  
Komari grunted, standing a bit, “Sounds like some sneaky shit they’d do. Let’s--”  
  
Shin just glanced to the overhang of the steps. The guy was wearing red fatigues, the Zech’s armor of choice. He had a gun and it was pointed at Yamada.   
  
_“I have, however, lost a best friend.”_  
  
Fuck. Not…not _another one_.  
  
He didn’t even call for her to get down, he just shot straight, not concerned about breathing or anything in that second except losing her. Komari’s face was alarmed, quickly looking over her shoulder at the Zech’s soldier falling off the railing and hitting the ground. Shin exhaled hard, staring at the blood seeping through some human’s shirt and onto this ground all for nothing.   
  
…Fuck.  
  
“Don’t zone out, Yagami, stay with me.”  
  
Shin jolted when Komari grabbed his arm, pulling him up. Right, right, no…no time for reflection. Life or death. This is what his dad meant, they…they don’t care what he was feeling right now.   
  
That one was enough. But by the second level, all hell broke loose. Five or six Zechs shot from a corner, screaming at them to stand down. Joro got one, Saki got one, Komari got two, he got two. Master gunmen. Master assassins.  
  
Everything went black as one of the bastards came out holding a small girl with a gun to her head, screaming, “Stand down or I take her fucking brain out!!”  
  
“Hey, hey, you don’t wanna do that, man” Shin said slowly in English, “This is a lose-lose, we have this place surrounded.”   
  
…What was this guy? He wasn’t Iraqi, he had a fucking Scottish accent, what the fuck? “I said fucking stand down or she fucking dies, fuckers!”  
  
“Look, dumbass, you don’t make it out of this situation if she dies!” Shin snapped, “Put her down and put your hands up!”  
  
“You don’t think I’m fucking serious!! I’ll--”  
  
Shin swallowed hard as Komari shot the guy through the head, the little girl screaming as she and the now dead body hit the ground. Crouching, Shin picked the little girl up, backing up quickly to where they were all huddled. The little girl was still shrieking as he patted her back, whispering in Arabic, “Hey, hey…Nothing is wrong. You are safe.  
  
Or so he _lied_. The girl’s mother rushed out, looking like she was ready to collapse. Shin handed the girl off and Joro directed the level outside. One more…  
  
Komari gave his hand a brief squeeze as they stealthily went up the steps. While he’d have never expected her to be maternal, she praised him. ‘You’re doing great, baby’. Was…was he?  
  
Fuck. He started slowly opening the doors but there was _no one_ in the first few rooms. He started to throw them open wildly and they were all empty. Damn it! “They got them.”  
  
“Fucking assholes” seethed Komari, behind him.  
  
When they got to the last door, Shin almost tore the door off the hinges. He paused, startled. Komari grabbed his arm, aiming her gun, hissing “Get back!”  
  
“Wait!” Shin rasped.  
  
“Shin--”  
  
He pushed Komari back to the other side of the hall and he stared hard. In the room was a teenage boy holding an AK-47 pointed at them. He wasn’t wearing scarlet fatigues, just the elaborate robes of the Earthmates. While his mouth was covered, it was the eyes. Shin’s eyes narrowed and he waved his hand, saying in Arabic. “ _Hand it over to me.”_  
  
He was sure his group was appalled. The boy’s hands were shaking as Shin continued to look firm, gesturing again, “ _Give it to me_. _Now.”_  
  
The young man was shaking as he got closer, whispering, “ _They will kill me.”  
  
“A…abaq hadiana? Min’na, orite” _he said under his breath. Remain calm. In Japanese, he advised ‘everyone, get down’.  
  
It was _panicked_ but he snatched the boy _fast_ and shoved him face first into the ground, the rest of the crew also diving to the ground. A hail of bullets came. Komari glared, “W-Where are they coming from?”  
  
Shin gritted his teeth, “…The other building.”  
  
They’d infiltrated under their noses. The building was maybe a foot or so from this one, providing easy access to another escape route they _weren’t guarding._ The kid choked, handing the gun over to him feverishly. Shin took it, holding the boy down as they crawled out back to the front.   
  
He couldn’t help grimace as Sergeant Sato was outside, barking orders. Sato…had been sent over from being the gun instructor in his basic to be a Sergeant here. The same one that called him a ‘fucking rich kid’. Oh boy.  
  
“Joro! Saki! What the hell is going on in there?!”  
  
“Sir, the-the building to the west, there are additional Zechian soldiers there, sir. They were shooting at Yagami” Saki reported.  
  
The man glowered at him. Yea, there was a reason that man didn’t address him nor Yamada as well in that sequence. “And who is this?”  
  
“A-Ah, it’s, um, a-a kid Yagami was talking to. He-He did have a gun but Yagami talked him down!” Joro gushed.  
  
Sato’s eyes only darkened and Shin pursed his lips when the teenager was cuffed at his command. Great. “Get back on the Humvee and report back to base. They’ll get your full…synopsis there.”  
  
Sure. Shin managed to walk firmly to the Humvee, sitting quietly. Komari silently stared at him as he digested everything that just happened. Riding along the sandy paved roads, he remembered once, when he was twelve, his dad managed to do four triple bypass surgeries in something like twenty hours. They said that in itself was a great feat but that all four of them were emergency and all four of them lived was even more fantastic. He’d been proud of his papa…  
  
He just killed six people in one day.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
What had he really been thinking?  
  
Yagami Shin sat outside of the office of the Sergeant, his hands rested on his knees. He hadn’t even had a chance to wash the miscellaneous blood off of him yet. Literal sweat, blood, and, yes, some tears. When the traffic in the hallway stopped for about an hour, he had a good nice cry. The waning adrenaline brought him crashing further down into reality and he felt sick.  
  
Shaun’s words when he announced this _great_ thing he was going to do rang through his head nonstop: “ _You’re gonna kill people, nii-san_?” Yea, kid. Your onii-san killed people. And just killed a half dozen in one day. One. Day.  
  
“Yagami!”  
  
And now, to top his misery, was a good talking down to. Shin stood, opening the door, as Joro came out from giving his side of the story. He guessed he should be grateful, Yamada wasn’t able to give _any_ version.  
  
“A-Ah, good luck, man” Joro blurted.   
  
“Thanks.”  
  
Shin came in and stood, crossing his arms at his back. Sergeant Sato was flipping through some notes before peering up at him, his eyes half closed. “Yagami.”  
  
“Sir.”  
  
“I got Saki and Joro’s report of what happened today. Am I to understand you ran out as…bait for a Zechian target?”  
  
“To give Yamada the shot, sir.”  
  
“A sacrificial move” he droned, tipping back more pages, “Which I find funny in the face of you apparently not shooting an armed assailant immediately when the opportunity presented itself.”  
  
… “He was an Earthmate, sir. The Zechs had used him as a scapegoat to shoot us while they escaped, sir.”  
  
Sato spat, “You psychic or something, Yagami? You just could see through their plot immediately?”  
  
“No, sir. But he was a scared teenager, I could see it immediately and I could see I could talk him down, sir.”  
  
Shin swallowed when Sato slammed the notepad down. “You don’t know if that boy had a _bomb_ strapped to him or whether he would have shot up your entire _unit,_ Yagami. You had the shot and you didn’t take it. Is that what I’m to understand?”  
  
“The Earthmates are the ones we’re supposed to _protect_ , sir--”  
  
“Not when they’re pointing a _gun at us,_ Yagami!”  
  
Enough. “With _all_ due respect, _sir_ , and at the risk of my _military career_ , I will indicate right here for your report and recording, _sir_ : I _will not_ shoot a _frightened teenager_. _Especially_ when he has the _safety_ on the gun, _sir_.”  
  
He could give _two fucks_ when the man went postal, calling him a ‘renegade rebel’ and ‘ignorant pompous jackass’ that was a danger to himself and others. Sato said he’d ‘make sure’ Shin was dishonorably discharged ‘on his _life_ ’. He just came about two words short of calling him a ‘dumb fuck hafu’. Shin did not care. “Is that all, sir?”  
  
Sato gritted his teeth so hard, his jaw got taut. Shin just stared at him absently, awaiting dismissal. It was silent for two minutes. “ _Is_ that _all, sir_?”  
  
“Get out of here.”  
  
Shin turned and left, trembling with anger. So this was it, huh? So be it. Maybe…maybe he wasn’t cut out for this.  
  
Other members of the unit looked at him, covered in blood, as he went to his barracks and grabbed fresh clothes. Komari wasn’t there, probably somewhere wondering why she couldn’t even TELL a story. Idiots. Idiots!  
  
He shivered in the cold water. It was nowhere near 112 degrees now so a cold shower was not comfortable. Otherwise, he would have stood in there for hours to get this feeling off of him. He dried off and dumped his fatigues in the laundry before putting on a clean shirt and the army conscript pants. It was okay. He…he could stand to go home.  
  
When he went back to his room, not even slightly hungry enough to peruse the mess hall, this time he found Komari there. She jumped to her feet and rushed to him. “Oh my God, Shin, are you okay?”  
  
Shin sighed as she hugged his neck, hugging her waist with one arm. But then, who…who would she get stuck with in the interim? What if it was some asshole that took advantage? Ugh. “…I’m all right, Komari.”  
  
She pulled him to sit, scowling, “You don’t _look_ all right. What did that asshole say to you?”  
  
“…I don’t think I’m cut out for this.”  
  
“ _He said that_?”  
  
“…Well, yea, he said it too but I’m thinking it’s true.”  
  
Komari glared, “Shin, you did _exceptionally well_. Fuck, I don’t know if you realized but you had _two hostage situations_ and you saved _both hostages_. You had _all of our backs_ and you were reading the whole room. I know the fuck I was impressed!”  
  
He smiled grimly, “Thanks.”  
  
Before she said anymore, there was a knock at the door. Komari sighed, “Come in.”  
  
Surprisingly, it was Joro and Saki. They looked panicked. “A-Ah, Yagami, you’re not in trouble, right?”  
  
“…Dunno, maybe? It’s okay, you guys told the truth as you should have.”  
  
Komari looked puzzled, “Um, what part of that would get you in trouble, Yagami?”  
  
“…The kid. He…he said I should have shot him, that I put you all in danger because maybe he had a bomb strapped to him or something. I had a clear shot and I should have taken it.”  
  
Saki looked alarmed. “I-I mean, _at first,_ I was tempted to because I was in complete _freak out_ mode but when you got us to stop and you were talking to him, I started to realize he was no bigger than my kid sister at home! And as much as he was shaking, it might as well had been her that was holding an assault rifle too! I was stunned!”  
  
“Yea, that kid was ready to _piss himself_. Not to mention, what the hell did it matter if he had a bomb? We shot him and we _all died_ when he pulled it? Plus, after you shot him, they still could have shot you! Sato’s just full of shit, man, don’t let it get to you” Joro shook his head.  
  
Shin nodded softly. If…anything could be said for today, he…he didn’t shoot a victimized teenage boy. “…Well, Sato’s holding the reigns, said I might get discharged so…we’ll see what happens.”  
  
“And I’ll go _fuck up his life_ ” Komari leered, “We did _exactly_ what we were supposed to: we saved the Terrans. Yes, some of them got captured but I looked at the occupancy report, we got out more than eighty percent of those people. If we didn’t act, dozens of people would have been shuffled off to some camp to be killed and Sato can go _fuck himself_.”  
  
…Right. Right. It…it wasn’t a hundred percent but, in reality, a hundred percent wasn’t reasonable to expect. They…they did what he wanted: help people.  
  
…Didn’t expect it to be quite this loaded a pill to swallow though.

“Is this your first time killing, Yamada?”  
  
Joro and Saki advised they were going to check on Sugo who was in critical but ‘more stable than he should be’ condition. When they left, he curled up in a ball and cried. He didn’t care if Komari gave him shit right now, he…he wasn’t expecting this. He wasn’t…expecting to feel this way.  
  
Komari allowed him to rest his head in her lap and stroked his hair, humming to him. That’s what he was: a gigantic baby. He did what he had to so those people were now ‘safe’ in their homes, waiting for another potential attack. And he needed to stop kidding himself: He did what he did so he could go home to his father in one piece like he promised. Those men died so he could live.  
  
Komari wasn’t bothered though. She hadn’t been bothered at all on the field. She wasn’t bothered now. Was this the first time? She shook her head, “No. In that recovery of a Zech’s leader I told you about, I had to kill about four people.”  
  
“…Oh.”  
  
“You’re just a sweet kid, Shin” she explained, “I mean, I’m not going to say it didn’t bother me—it did. I cried a little bit. I’m not particularly religious but I wondered if I was going to hell now. I wasn’t killing in kami or Inari’s name, y’know?”  
  
He nodded and she shrugged, “…We’re in a very strange circumstance, Yagami, being the line between life and death while being on the line between life and death as well. I know it feels bad right now—like you’ve done something terrible. And, knowing your circumstances, you’re probably thinking your dad is a lifesaver and you’re here completing his antithesis. It’s true—we are killing. But we wouldn’t be if this sect of people didn’t decide to start raising guns and murdering people for essentially their technology. The only saving grace is we’re not killing because we want to. And that’s why I’ll knock Sato’s teeth in if he really tries to discharge you for saving that kid: you could have killed him and it would have been for no reason. We’re here to do better than the Zechs.”  
  
…Yes.  
  
They both jumped when there was a knock at the door. Eh? “Ah, Yagami, Sugo wants to see you!”  
  
“O-Oh. All right. Tell him give me a sec.”  
  
Taking a deep breath, he waited a few moments for the redness in his face to go down. Komari followed as he walked to the infirmary. He grimaced, seeing the wounded and wondering why they weren’t allowed to stay and help. What if…what if some of their own died too?  
  
“Yagami” Sugo said weakly from the hospital style bed, propped up.  
  
“Captain Sugo, are-are you okay?” Shin rasped.  
  
Shin wasn’t particularly close to Sugo so he was a little alarmed and confused when the man patted his hands suddenly. “Doctor said you managed to pack the wounds well enough I didn’t hemorrhage out immediately. I owe you.”  
  
“O-Oh, no, sir. I-I just know a little bit.” A very…at the time, boring lecture from his dad he received before he left about how to handle very specific wounds and essentially tricks to quell bleeding. He…he guessed he could have been an okay doctor.  
  
“A lot of bit, Yagami. Saki was telling me Sato was reaming you out over something?”  
  
Great. “W-Well, I may not have followed _direct_ protocol, sir…”  
  
“Yagami!”  
  
Oh God.   
  
Colonel Teramoto Ken strode into the room, his dark hair pulled back underneath his beret. Shin quickly stood correctly as did Komari. Teramoto tipped his head, “Yagami, Yamada, come with me.”  
  
And here was the end. His great illustrious career ended in a year. He followed, swallowing hard, and braced himself to be removed. His…his dad would be happy.  
  
They walked into the very back where Teramoto’s office or quarters were, a simple room with just a long table. Komari grunted lowly as Sato was sitting on one side of the table, appearing very…aggravated. Pissed, even. Great. However, another figure was seated at the very end of the table. It…  
  
Shin breathed in, startled, to find it was the teenager that he rescued. The young man had dark brown hair and darker blue eyes, everything on him shaking as he trembled. Teramoto tilted his head, “He’s got information, Yagami. However, he indicated to our translator that he only wanted to talk to the guy that saved him.”  
  
…What? Shin stared, confused. Why…? Slowly walking to sit at the chair to his right, apparently the translator seated to his left, Shin gazed. Like he expected, what really made him freeze, was he probably was little older than Shaun or Tony. He could have never… “U-Um, can-can you tell him my Arabic is spotty?”  
  
The translator, a young man nodded, and replied. The lad talked and the translator nodded, “He said your Arabic was good enough today. He thanks you.”  
  
“… _Marhabaan bik_.” You’re welcome.  
  
“Hold on, Shin.”  
  
Oh. He looked up, shocked, as Komari stood there with her arms crossed, leaning against a wall nearby. “The kid says he’s got information. He’ll _only_ speak to Yagami because Yagami didn’t _slaughter him_ today. If you all are going to be utilizing Yagami today and giving him discharge papers tomorrow, I would, on the record, advise Yagami to tell you to go fuck yourselves.”  
  
Oh boy. Just continuously shocked how frank she was, Shin noted that Sato’s face darkened considerably. What? Teramoto scoffed, “Between Sugo advising me Yagami saved his life today along with Joro, Saki, and now a valuable informant—”  
  
“He saved my life too” Komari interrupted.  
  
“—And Yamada’s on top of rescuing a good amount of Terrans so I don’t have to write an excuse to why an entire commune in a village we’re supposed to be monitoring was not only infiltrated but kidnapped, I’d like to think you don’t believe we’re that stupid, Yamada. I wouldn’t have signed off either way.”  
  
Shin exhaled, his heart beating fast. Oh. Sato glared, looking to Teramoto, “…It’s still worthy of reprimand.”  
  
“Joro and Saki insisted that Yagami made sure they stood back enough distance to keep them reasonably safe. Additionally, had Yagami just plain slaughtered the boy, we would have diplomats up our ass for years, Sato.”  
  
Komari nodded solemnly, seeming…relieved. Thank…thank goodness…but, she…  
  
“…I do have one other condition to interview, sir” Shin said carefully.  
  
“What is this, the bargaining table?” Teramoto demanded, his face registering instant irritation.  
  
Shin slowly held up his hands, “It’s a fairly simple request, sir: Yamada was responsible for disengaging the shooter that shot at Sugo. She also downed a Sechian soldier holding a Terran little girl hostage. Her telling of events is extremely valuable and crucial and I think it’s both a mistake and a disservice to her and the event to not get her account. I think Joro and Saki spoke on all _I_ did out of concern but Yamada took charge of this event, sir.”  
  
Teramoto looked…extremely puzzled. What? She did. “…What do you mean Yamada’s account wasn’t taken?”  
  
“Sir--” Sato started.  
  
The man snatched up a manila folder, flipping through as his expression blackened like a stormy night.

“Was she not _present on that field_ , Sato? Spouting protocols when the most basic one is ‘if you’re there, you give an account’!” Teramoto snapped, “And apparently she had a _body count_ and you didn’t even have that side of the report? Take her account _now_ while Yagami and I get this information.”  
  
If looks could murder and bludgeon their bodies, Sato managed to fit it into one nanosecond glare toward them. Shin’s eyes narrowed back and Komari just smirked. Sorry the prejudice didn’t pay off this once, jackass. Sato stood up, jerking the chair back loudly, and stalked out of the room with Komari following…Teramoto caught him, staring evenly, “…By the book, _Lieutenant.”_  
  
“…Yes, Colonel.”  
  


What? Shin looked over his shoulder, a bit concerned. Teramoto cleared his throat, “…We will assure that everything is handled to the letter, Yagami. I would be lying if I told you I hadn’t hoped she’d have buckled by now but I’d also be lying if I didn’t admit she was a great asset. You two work well together.”  
  
“O-Oh, well, I-I thank you for listening, sir.” Work well together…  
  
Shin turned to the young man, asking in Arabic: “What’s your name?”  
  
“Raga.”  
  
“It’s nice to meet you, Raga. My name is Shin. I thank you for trusting me in that moment today.”  
  
Raga bit his lip and nodded, rasping, “They-they took my mother and sister. My mother and sister are highly regarded in the Earthmate community. My-My father is in Baghdad on business right now. He’ll be very upset with me, I-I was supposed to protect them. Instead, they-they told me they’ll blow their heads off if I-I didn’t guard the room to draw out soldiers for them to kill to aid their advance.”  
  
Shin scowled, “It’s not your fault, Raga. These people are wrongly persecuting your family and people. They said you have information. What do you know?”  
  
Leaning in closer, Raga whispered, “Some-Some of the soldiers weren’t very smart. I heard them whisper that they were going to take the people they kidnapped to an area about thirty miles east of here called Sharance. They-They said they were going to torture them there.”  
  
…Okay. Shin leaned back and nodded, “…Understood.”  
  
Teramoto frowned as Shin stood, patting Raga’s shoulder, “…I don’t want to promise you and lead you to false faith but I…I want to get your sister and mother back for you. Family is…is important when you’re close.”  
  
“P-Please. And-And if there’s anything else I can do, I want to help” he blurted.  
  
Shin smiled and nodded, Teramoto tipping his head once as they exited, leaving the kid with the translator. Teramoto raised a brow, “I understood ‘Sharance’.”  
  
“According to him, that’s where they said they were going to take the prisoners for torture.”  
  
Teramoto paused, glowering at him, “…You don’t believe him.”  
  
“Oh, I don’t think he’s lying, sir. Just seems a bit strange to go a manageable amount of miles from where they were kidnapped in the first place to get the torturing in” Shin said slowly.  
  
The man chuckled. What? “So I take it you haven’t heard about Sharance, huh?”  
  
“No…” Shin frowned, “What is it?”  
  
“A _nightmare_. Get some rest for a few hours. We strike at midnight.”  
  
… _Again_? He…he had to go kill _more_ people?? Shin grimaced, rubbing his arm. Damn it, he…he did promise Raga though that he’d try to save his family.  
  
He…he had to accept that it came with the territory. It…was suffocating.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _February 1 st, 2001.  
  
Yagami Shin had told Yamada Komari when she got back that there was no way in Hell he could sleep knowing what they were going to be doing soon. She went to her bag, broke a pill in half, and gave it to him quietly. Despite literally everything he grew up with and all his general wariness, he popped it without question. The last thing he recalled was taking that when the siren rang four hours later.  
  
He got up, a little groggy, and started to pull on his combat gear and khaki brown fatigues. Komari was doing the same silently. He registered she hadn’t said a word to him since she spoke to Sato…damn it.  
  
“What happened with Sato?” he asked, sitting on his bed to lace up his boots.  
  
She shrugged, putting on her headgear. Shin sulked. “You know, the less you talk, the more suspicious you come off.”  
  
Komari smirked at him, “Come on, kid, we don’t want to be late.”  
  
Hmm. Shin stood, following her and getting into lineup. A sergeant called roll and started assigning. Some people needed to stay behind for communications. Him? “Yagami, combat team four.”  
  
Terrific, lucky number four. Making a face despite his lack of belief in superstition, he paused when the man advised Yamada ‘communications team’. Pardon??  
  
Komari didn’t look even slightly surprised, her lips pressed together in a line. That fucking Sato. Shin’s eyes narrowed as combat teams were advised to go for weapons and ammunition. Swiftly turning on his heel, he walked up to Teramoto who was discussing something with the remaining Captains. The man cocked a brow at him, “…You lost, Yagami?”  
  
“…I know this isn’t some stupid action thriller where I make some brilliant demand and threats to get my way, sir. But I would be remiss to not indicate that leaving an expert marksman specializing in sniping here to do communications is an overwhelmingly poor decision.”  
  
“Yagami, you screwing this girl or something?”  
  
“No!” Shin hissed, “I just want her to be treated like the valuable member of this unit that she is, sir. I will gladly stay back and take her place if it means she gets to use her skillset and talents.”  
  
“Girl can shoot an ant off a grain of rice, sir” one of the captains conceded.  
  
Teramoto snorted. “I’m pulling Yagami’s leg because he’s already watched me have to get in Sato’s face once in the last four hours and now I have to reprimand the idiot again. I already told him to frame Combat Team 4 around the original squad that was able to infiltrate and rescue the commune. Captain Fumi, pull Yamada and get her out there too.”  
  
Relieved beyond belief, Shin bowed and rushed off to get…weapons. Here we go.  
  
“You really take that ‘hero’ thing serious. That or you’ll just keep flexing the ‘I’m the man that can get things done for the struggling female’ angle, huh?”  
  
Shin cut his eyes to his side as Komari handed over her orders, her face irritable. “I mean, did you WANT to be on communications? Because I can retract and say I misunderstood.”  
  
“Of course I didn’t want to be on communications” she snapped under her breath, “Sato threatened and said I’d never see an ounce of combat again in my career because I don’t know my place. Then, all hail the great hero, after he goes snitching to the Colonel, I’m put into active duty. How does that look for either of us, dumbass?”  
  
“I could give a shit what it looks like. I told Raga I was going to do everything in my power to get his mom and sister back and that’s what I’m going to do. And we’re not doing it any easier with you here answering phone calls” Shin countered.  
  
“Yagami--”  
  
“My dad would probably rather kill me himself than see what I did today-- yesterday, running out as bait but I knew you had my back, Yamada. And I hope I’ve proven I have your back too. At the end of the day, I don’t care what either of us are considering our genitals and I hope you don’t care what nationality my dad is. We came here to save these people and prove ourselves at the same time. We got this or not?” demanded Shin evenly.  
  
Komari glowered at him before sighing, throwing on her pack and shrugging. “We got this.”  
  
“Good” Shin muttered, “…Let’s just make sure we don’t give them something stupid to say.”  
  
She finally smiled, cracking her knuckles, “…I dig it. Let’s fuck em’ up.”  
  
_XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
End Notes:

Y’know, Ryuu, avoiding the sacrificial female thing is great but, once again, you have the problematic lesbian. I’m trying to do better, ya’ll, give me a chance. There’s like 500 pages to go. Anywho, Komari and Kasumi are characters from Trio of Towns. Honestly? These two definitely seem like they could be a couple. Also, Kasumi really does seem to have a problem with dudes so it’s really kind of odd she lets you woo her? I dunno, I never tried but okay.  
  


Inari comes up a few times. He remains the god of the town.  
  
Mako is from Tale of Two Towns but since Konohana seems like a similar concept as Tsuyukasa, I just threw him in there. Komari was childhood friends with his son. There’s other characters Komari mentions that are a bit of a slant but I didn’t name them directly since I might want to use them later.  
  
So another interesting thing I found, apparently due to a law or at least disapproval of eating turtle, Komari’s favorite food was edited in the European version to be okonomiyaki. While I’m of the school of I’ll try any food at least once, I will admit, I saw the preparation of turtle stew on Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives (it’s an American series where this guy name Guy Fieri just drives around different places to eat in the U.S. and sometimes other countries...you know, the dream) once and…yea, that’s where I draw the line, it was pretty horrendous.  
  
Elena is from Rune Factory: Tides of Destiny like Aden and Sonja…and Aden is controlling a ‘armored tanker’. Remember Ymir?  
  
So they mention Evelyn and ‘Guy’. This is a nod to Rune Factory 3.  
  
And yea…if you know, you know. Sharance _is_ hell. But I gotta say, which hell is worse: Sharance or a certain other endgame?   
  
  
  



	10. Fun

**Chapter 10:** Fun  
  
 **Author’s Note:** Whoo buddy, this one was too tough for me to figure out how to divide reasonably so…yea, AO3, you have almost 70 pages. FF, you are…probably going to have a little less with the smut removed.   
  
**Warning:** Macabre imagery and drugs. AO3, you have…a little more sex there. Enjoy!

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Shin grimaced, rubbing his temple as he stared out of the window of the plane. Melatonin.  
  
Whatever he’d seen on television that had called him to take this action of joining the military was sanitized. It warned that the images may be upsetting to viewers but it was taking the most acceptable views of this monstrosity and placing it out for public consumption. What was actually taking place was not sanitized.  
  
Sharance _was_ a nightmare and for a couple reasons. The first was it was a damn maze, rooms leading to other rooms that had no outlet. He actually got out a scrap piece of paper to track which rooms they went through that actually got them going to what he hoped was forward. It had so many walls and windows that the Zechs could shoot them from about five different angles at any time. They checked every corner about three times, crouching low where possible, and avoiding all openings. He heard other combat teams taking artillery fire but he and Komari kept pressing their group to stay low.   
  
The second reason it was a nightmare was it was the most gruesome thing he never could have imagined. Limbs were hanging…everywhere. Severed _limbs._ Just…hanging, like they were fucking curtains or something. Joro had dry heaved but Shin managed to keep himself calm by only a _miracle_. Blood was just…everywhere.  
  
Komari was the most disturbingly calm. She analyzed the room and whispered to them, “The blood’s not fresh at all and the flesh is dried out. This is a previous torture session.”  
  
Disgusting. They crept into the next room, finding something more unthinkable from place to place. It was the room with the eyes that almost caved the entirety of them but Shin quickly pushed for them to hustle. Please, just…  
  
they got to a long hallway, there were cages and about thirty different guards. He saw the Terrans there, shivering. At that point? After going through about a dozen rooms full of the Zechs’ work or dead ends? For that entire fire fight, Shin _snapped_. He was glad he managed to scream to the Terrans to ‘get down’ because he wasn’t sure he was discerning very well. It wasn’t until the adrenaline settled that he processed that he killed about eight Zechian soldiers. Komari, Joro, Saki, and several others also agreed that what they had seen in the rooms, it was just…dehumanizing, and it made them almost go postal. In that second, they’d…they’d _all_ been dehumanized.  
  
They quickly got into the cells and got the Terrans out. Saki radioed to the other combat teams that they had secured the kidnapped and were now moving them to the Humvees…across this _entire facility_. Thank _God_ he made a map because he would have just flipped out otherwise.  
  
Managing a scared and horrified group of people was a different challenge in itself. They kept crying and screaming upon seeing the macabre torture chambers and it was drawing a lot of undo attention. By the time they exited the building, around twenty more Zechs had been killed. Sixteen. He had managed to kill almost eight people a day in the last two days.  
  
Komari was back to back with him, shooting as he directed the group onto the truck. There were too many Zechian soldiers. She could pick one, two, three offs but they were starting to crowd. Luckily, the combat team came up from behind and started to mow the Zechian groups down enough for them to get the last Terran on the Humvee…except…  
  
 _Almuhtal! Almuhtal!_ Some of them kept screaming that, pointing at one of the Terrans that was about to be placed on the transport. Almuhtal? He hadn’t heard that one before. Shin stared at the man. Something…wasn’t quite right. Shin had drawled, “… _Madha yaeni?”_ What does it mean? He may not understand the explanation but perhaps it was a warning to heed and he could explain.  
  
The guy froze. What? He learned ‘what does it mean?’ or ‘do you speak English or Japanese?’ in a few dozen languages. Farsi then? Some spoke Farsi. He tried again in Persian. The man blanched. _Bunun anlami ne? Dani artham emiti? Itan porul enna? Kore ha nan deshou ka? What does it mean?  
  
_ The guy reached into his pocket but the damage was done, Komari shot him square in the head, Joro rushing over and finding a gun. Shin had gritted his teeth so hard, he felt them creak. He’d grabbed his radio, bellowing, “ _Ask if there are almuhtal!! Ask!!”  
  
_ Komari had been _horrified._ The Zechs were going to _sneak back_ amidst the group. This was the _last group,_ meaning the others may have ‘almuhtal’ aboard that were going to shoot the Earthmates or soldiers. She gripped her chest, all of them listening to the radio with bated breath. Please, God, it had…it had been too much.  
  
Shin had almost collapsed when the drivers and soldiers aboard chimed back that the Terrans reported no almuhtal on their convoys. Shin found out it meant, roughly, ‘fraud’.   
  
It was a success. They…they recovered every Terran.  
  
Oh, everyone had been thrilled, ready to _party_ when they got back from the base to the barracks. Shin quietly slipped off to the showers, stood in the cold water for about thirty minutes, and went to bed at around 10 o’clock that morning. Yea, they did it. Whoo.  
  
Komari came in around 11, also freshly bathed, and sank down next to him while he was sleeping. Some part of him had been concerned about Teramoto’s off-color question of whether he was ‘screwing this girl’ with that action but the other hadn’t cared. She hugged his waist from behind and he needed it.   
  
When Raga was released back to his family, he came to Shin in tears and thanked him profusely, insisting he would never ever forget this and he hoped to be like him one day. Nah. Not…not like this…

And for the next two weeks, they continued to patrol with heavier units, accomplishments like Fashion Week far from his mind. He hadn’t talked to his parents since around mid-January but he managed to call to tell them he’d be home on Tuesday, February 20th, 2001. He’d get to see the twins turn nineteen before he was back here, possibly killing people again or coming across severed legs and arms. The little girl that brought him flowers still had made him smile though.  
  
On February 19th, he’d packed and was dismayed he had to wear his fatigues until they got back to the airport. No. He wanted a break from being a soldier.   
  
Komari had been all grins though. _“Oh my GOD, I cannot wait to get home to some home cooking, a soft bed, and burying my face in my baby’s crotch.”_  
  
“ _Just something else, Yamada”_ he’d smirked.  
  
“ _Yagami, get yourself some ass because you NEED it”_ Komari had leered, poking him in the chest, _“That’s on the prescription, buddy: ass, sleep, relaxation, and calm. It’s an order.”  
  
_ With what they’d accomplished, all of them were promoted. Saki and Joro were promoted to Specialist while Komari was promoted to Corporal. He was now Private First Class…because he saved people and killed people in the process.  
  
Komari knew he’d been messed up. She grabbed his shoulders when he sat down and glared, “ _Yagami, I know this was a TOUGH first deployment. You’ve been a part of some action that even seasoned soldiers don’t see. But you did exactly what you said you were gonna do and don’t you beat yourself up for that just because the road was a little bloodier than you were prepared for. When you go home, don’t think about this, relax with your family, go to a hot spring, get some pussy, and take some melatonin to help you sleep and avoid jet lag. Got me? I’ll see you when we get back in May._ ”  
  
Melatonin. Okay.  
  
He looked up when it was announced they were landing in the Tokyo airport. He didn’t even know what day it was now. He left at noon on the 19th from Iraq…calculating, he concluded it was now noon in Japan on the 20th. Crazy.  
  
It was like he’d warped into some foreign universe as he shuffled out with the crowd to the main area to get his luggage. He quietly looked around at the billboards, grimacing when his mind had to readjust to seeing hiragana, katakana, and kanji, what he’d used this _entire life_ until six months ago. Shaking his head, he went and stood by the conveyor belt, receiving stares from passerby. He had lost _some_ of his tan but he was still considerably darker than when he left. Not to mention he’d gotten a bit more muscular and, to his horror, taller. At his last physical he checked in at 6’1”, 185 centimeters. Add in the fatigues and he probably looked like a complete foreigner right now.  
  
When he came out to the parking lot, he smiled some seeing other soldiers reuniting with their families. While most were traditionalist and containing their excitement, some had absolutely spazzed with glee. He looked around and…just melted.  
  
Yagami Dana was standing there patiently, wearing a cream colored knee length dress, her hands folded in front of her. Probably a habit from her upbringing, one she never quite lost. Some people were looking at her, possibly recognizing her. God, he…he was home. He had a home to return to after all he’d done.  
  
His mom looked shocked as he approached. “Oh my God, my Sweetie Plum!!”  
  
His family was the anti-reserved, he thought with a laugh as she managed to hug him around the neck after lunging at him. Holding her tight, he rasped, “I’m-I’m home, mama…”  
  
She held him, probably feeling unending turmoil in his very essence. She let go to hold his hands, still smiling with tears in her eyes. His mother probably was used to turmoil. “I’m glad, sweetie. So glad. C’mon, let’s get you to the house so you can change out of that awful khaki.”  
  
He snickered and opened the door to the first vehicle he’d been in that was also not khaki colored or a Jeep or Humvee in months. Climbing into the passenger side, taking a deep breath, he looked back. No one, huh…?  
  
“Baby, can we make one stop?” his mother asked as she eased out of the terminal.  
  
“Of course, mama…” Shin frowned, a bit confused she’d ask.  
  
Dana smiled and nodded, “Your papa is quite, _quite_ upset he got pulled into a complicated surgery. He’s taken the whole week off to be here when you got home but Matsushima called him, practically begging. He has to stay there until eleven for postop too.”  
  
Oh dang. “Well, that sounds really important, mama, I understand.”  
  
“Well, I don’t want to ask like you went on a luxury cruise, sweetie, but how was it?”  
  
…How was it. Shin swallowed, trembling as he gazed out of the window, “…Mama?”  
  
“Yes, sweetie?”  
  
“I…I had to kill people. Enough…enough people that-that if it were me acting on my own accord, I’d be a serial killer but, because I did it in the name of saving people, it’s okay. How…how is it okay?”  
  
He wiped his eyes, breathing out. Wow, buzzkill. About to apologize, his mother reached out and held his hand. “Were those people you killed out and about, shopping, eating dinner, going to see their family?”  
  
“What…? No…”  
  
“Were they going to school? To the movies? To see their children be born?”  
  
“ _No_. But--”  
  
“Those people are just like you. They could have been living their life to whatever their ability was and doing anything in the world. Instead of reading a novel or going to the ocean, enriching their lives by whatever means, they decided to take that away from _other people_.”  
  
Shin’s eyes widened, looking to her. She was staring at the road evenly. “Those people decided that what made them happy was to kidnap, torture, rape, and murder another group of people who wanted to live their lives comfortably. Those people decided that because that’s what made them happy, people like my son who also wants to live his life comfortably have to go and torment themselves, kill when they don’t even want to, because _they_ decided this was their path to happiness. They force my baby to be judge, jury, and executioner because _they’re_ monsters who had every availability in the world, even if they were suffering. No, it is _not_ _okay.”  
  
_ Tears streamed down his face as they stopped at a red light. That crazy calm her and Koji had was all over her face. She stroked some of the wetness from his cheek, nodding, “You saved people? Did you hand the reigns of life back the people those same bastards tried to take it from?”  
  
“…Yes.”  
  
“…I wish I could bury your pain, Shin. I just know you need it because you’re going back and you have to have it to make you stronger” Dana whispered, “It’s too simple to say don’t let it bother you. Just know that you didn’t start this. These people had all the opportunities we can imagine and more. This didn’t start with you.”  
  
…Yes. He nodded, sniffing, “You’re…you’re right, mama, thank you.”  
  
“Of course, my Sweetie. Well, did anything _good_ happen?”  
  
Shin smiled weakly, nodding, “I got promoted to Private First Class.”  
  
“Congratulations! Uh, I don’t know where that puts you on the chain of command, but…”  
  
He chuckled, “Not _too_ high but I’m getting there. I-I honestly got to make a lot of calls that I shouldn’t have been able to so I did get a taste of the command life. Probably want to get there if I don’t retire after my deployments are done.”  
  
“Well, you’ve led your crazy siblings for years so you have the experience” Dana droned.  
  
Shin laughed at that, shaking his head, “Good lord. In comparison, I had an easier time in the army.”  
  
Prepared to ask where any of his five siblings were, he paused, startled, to find them in front of the hospital where his dad worked. Wait… “I…I thought dad was in surgery.”  
  
“In about twenty minutes” Dana smiled, pulling into a spot, “C’mon. His mind won’t be right if he doesn’t see you first.”  
  
Was she sure about that? He might distract him more. Swallowing, he got out of the vehicle and followed her in.   
  
Surprisingly, many of the longtime nurses actually completely freaked, squealing and rushing him with hugs and bowing and shaking his hand. He was…touched? He didn’t know this many people even liked him. His mom smirked when they wanted to escort him to his dad’s floor. “I don’t think he’d appreciate too much of a crowd, ladies.”  
  
They just laughed and rushed him along. Crowd? He walked aside his mom and felt his heart race seeing the blond haired man among the sea of dark colors, apparently talking. Dana called, “Yama.”  
  
Yagami Yamada looked up, quickly turning to them before the biggest smile crossed his face. Yea…this Shin came back.  
  
His dad came to him, hugging him tightly and exhaling. All Shin felt was his relief and it was kind of nice…he could only imagine the stress. Yamada held his shoulders, holding him out a bit and looking him over, “…God, you’re tall. Next time you might come back taller than me.”  
  
“I doubt it, dad” he grinned.  
  
“God, it’s good to see you back” Yamada whispered, “Everything okay? Are…are you all right?”  
  
“Mom kind of talked me out of a dark spot just now. I feel…vaguely better.”  
  
Yamada nodded and hugged him tightly again, “She’s good at that. We’ll talk about it when I get home, okay? I’m so glad to see you.”  
  
“You too, dad.”  
  
Dana gripped Yamada’s hand, kissing his cheek, “Don’t be distracted, Yama.”  
  
“Never that, dear” he smiled warmly, “Thank you.”  
  
Shin sighed as they walked out, rubbing his hands together, “…Little nippier here than it was in Iraq.”  
  
“I see that tan. I bet it was scalding hot” Dana gasped, opening the door to her car and getting in.  
  
They chatted until they were in the neighborhood and he started to get excited again. Dana came down the driveway and parked. Getting out, he grabbed his bag and eagerly went to the door. Dana smiled at him as she put a key into the knob, “I am not going to allow you to be stressed during this time, my Sweetie Plum…however, I may need you to beat up one or both of your littlest brothers.”  
  
“You got it, mama” he grinned.  
  
Home just smelled a certain way. While it was unusual for a brief second, it just immediately settled right into his soul, just so clean and fragrant. Walking down the hallway, his eyes widened, finding all of his siblings in the foyer arguing and holding signs reading ‘welcome home’. He smirked. Home sweet home. “Hey.”  
  
They all jumped, having not been paying a lick of attention before suddenly chanting, “Heyyyyy!!”  
  
Shin laughed as they all excitably hugged him, talking all at once. He…was glad this felt good. He thought he was losing his mind just an hour ago.  
  
“What the fuck, dude?” Yagami Nerimaru demanded, “You’re fucking huge.”  
  
“We’re the same height” Shin said dryly, as, once again, the twins very much were keeping up with him.  
  
“We’re not built like a damn tank though” Koji snorted, shaking his hand.  
  
Shin raised a brow as perhaps Koji wasn’t _quite_ as muscular as him but way more muscular than he had seen him. “Yea, not the only one.”  
  
“Oh, that’s for extracurriculars I can’t mention around our dear mummy” Koji smiled sweetly at Dana who leered at him.  
  
“Wow, really?” Shin droned.  
  
“Never mind, I want you to fight all of them except your sister” Dana replied in the same tone.  
  
Jill giggled, hugging his side, “I’m so glad you’re safe, nii-san!”  
  
“Me too, nii-san” Shaun agreed, standing with his hands in the pockets of his hoodie.  
  
Woah now, the hell? Jill grinned, swatting at Shaun, “Yea-a-a, someone’s voice got deeper.”  
  
Shaun pouted, looking sulky. Shin smirked, “What, the twins giving you crap about it?”  
  
“No. Tony does…” Shaun leered.  
  
Shin’s smirk widened to find Tony glancing at his cell phone, ever the burgeoning Mr. Popular. “Sorry my arrival is interrupting you, itoto.”  
  
“A-Ah, no!” Tony blurted, looking up quickly, “J-Just my girlfriend giving me crap. Sorry. I’m happy to see you too, Shin. Must’ve been hot as hell over there though.”  
  
“ _Unthinkably_ ” Shin groaned.  
  
“Have a seat, Sweetie Plum, we’re going to serve you lunch” Dana gushed, going into the kitchen.  
  
Normally, Shin wasn’t the jerk one but he almost found himself laughing to find Jill was actually a few inches taller than Tony right now. Puberty was a hell of a time for him to be away, jeez. Koji and Nelly helped settle everything on the table, the smell so intoxicating he was almost drooling. Jill laughed as she poured cups of lemonade. “Hungry, Shin?”  
  
“I have eaten chahan and watered down curry for _two months now_ ” Shin groaned, running his hands down his face.  
  
“Well, sorry to say, we also have fried rice” Koji laughed, setting said dish on the table.  
  
And it was probably a hundred times better than what he had at base. Smiling as everyone sat down for lunch and talked with him, he felt…good.  
  
…That’s what scared him, thinking back. How…far he got from that point for so long. He was glad he realized what he wanted for his family to be whole. But then? …Not so much.

  
XXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
“Whatcha doingggg, onii-sannnn?”   
  
“…I swear I hate you sometimes.”  
  
Yagami Shin got the shakes. He swore. He got down to _one_ but he still very much needed that _one_. What he did _not_ need was his parents seeing him with this habit he formally decried for _years_. Thus, he went and hid in the space underneath their deck to light up a cigarette, a highly unoccupied area. But naturally, one Yagami Koji popped up upside down right in front of him, having slipped under the railing with that stupid ass grin of his while he was preparing to light a cigarette.  
  
Shin sighed as Koji pushed the rest of his body through, managing to flip over and land on his feet near him. “Y’know, if it didn’t put us _both_ in terrible danger, I would say you’d make an unthinkably excellent stealth ops soldier. Give me all the shit you want but _please_ don’t tell dad and mom.”  
  
Koji smirked, crossing his arms, “I won’t…for now. Just wonder what happened to ol’ saintly over there.”  
  
“…Some bad stuff” Shin muttered, lighting up finally and exhaling.  
  
“It’s gonna sound repetitive and dumb as shit, Shin, but don’t beat yourself over whatever that ‘bad stuff’ is. Sometimes there’s only one way out” Koji offered, patting his pockets.  
  
Quirking his brows, Shin sighed, “Definitely not wrong about that…”  
  
“You have to do it?”  
  
“…Yea.”  
  
Grabbing a _black_ cigarette out of a black packet, Koji knelt and put one between his lips, lighting up with a black lighter because he was the ever loving child of darkness with his _black cigarettes_. “Y’know, I can’t imagine what would even make somebody just murder a bunch of people. Anything else you could be doing in the world.”  
  
“…The first time, it…it was in an apartment building basically. They took people out of their homes.”  
  
“Imagine us just chilling in the house and somebody runs in to kidnap and kill us” Koji muttered, “People are shit.”  
  
Shin grimaced. Yea… “Well, got some good news for me? How is school?”  
  
Koji shrugged, “It’s going well. Should graduate after three years like I’m planning. Y’know Keiba came with me and we ended up being roomed together. We also have this new guy named Domon that is in our dorm. Nice guy. Oh, uh, and it’s coed so that’s been a bit…fun.”  
  
Uh huh. “Yea, had my own coed situation. My roommate was the only girl in my barrack or unit.”  
  
“… _What_?”  
  
Nodding, Shin took a draw, “Yamada Komari. A hundred percent sure I wouldn’t have made it without her.”  
  
While Koji didn’t _ask_ , his eyes held the same questions as others had. Shin rolled his, “She has a girlfriend. We are _just_ friends.”  
  
“Oh, okay” Koji nodded.  
  
“And, despite my horrendous decisions from last year, I _can_ be just friends with a hetero single girl” Shin muttered.  
  
Koji waved a hand, “Of course, man, but I’m stuck in a meat factory for half a year with a hetero single girl and we’re friendly, I’m sorry, my mind might start to wander. And I’d feel weird about beating off sharing a room? Nah, if she was cool with it, some lines were gonna get blurred.”  
  
“I s’pose…” Shin drawled, tapping the ashes off, “I’m okay in that domain.”  
  
His younger brother snickered, “Oh really? You probably gave the porn we sent you away, especially since you were rooming with a lesbian. Gotta get your rocks off at least once.”  
  
“Nope.”  
  
“Uh huh” Koji droned, “Well, I unfortunately have to go back to school tonight but Friday? I’m coming to get you and we’re gonna at least get your ass wasted.”  
  
Shin groaned, “…I guess I can do a _few_ drinks. Update me on some other stuff. What are the kid’s up to?”  
  
It was Koji’s turn to groan as he stood up, “…Dunno. I _think_ Jill’s got some little bastard she’s hanging out with but it’s a little hard to catch with me being so busy and far away. My worst fear is coming true though: she’s gonna be attracting all sorts of creeps. Of course when _I_ look at her, she’s my precious baby sister, but I overheard one of her friends suggesting she’d get ‘all the boys with her rack’. I almost died that day, Shin, they almost took me out of the game of life.”  
  
Shin covered his face, cringing, “I wasn’t aware I was that unprepared to hear ‘my sister’ and ‘rack’ in the same sentence.”  
  
Koji nodded glumly as Shin put out his cigarette, shaking his head, “Well, I’ll see what’s afoot. Is the game plan still the same where I demand if the kid wants to bang our only sister and we want his brutal honesty?”  
  
“Man, I don’t even know anymore” Koji said, disgusted.  
  
Shin was about to remark when he heard light whispering. Hmm? Gazing up, it sounded like someone had come out on the deck. “Look, Setsuna, about last time…I liked it, okay? But you can’t just talk to me in public like that.”  
  
…Pardon? Why the hell was Tony not letting his girlfriend talk to him in public? He glanced at Koji and was shocked at how his eyes had darkened. What? I mean, it was a dick thing to do but it was nothing to get that mad over. Tony continued, “Yea, I’ll come over a little while after school finishes tomorrow, promise. Okay. Later.”  
  
Koji crossed his arms, stalking toward the steps leading back to the deck, Shin following quickly. Dang, he hadn’t been back a solid six hours yet and he was already back on older brother duty?? He groaned to find Koji indeed had grabbed the front of Tony’s shirt, the younger looking shocked. “Who the hell is Setsuna?”  
  
“N-No one! None of your business!” Tony barked.  
  
“Oh really? I just think it’s weird that I saw you kissing on Taiko last _night_ and today we have _Setsuna_?”  
  
… _Oh really_? “Oh, so we’re double timing now, are we?” Shin demanded.  
  
To finish this trifecta, Nelly opened the deck door and drawled, “That’s the dirt I got from Shaun.”  
  
Tony looked pissed. “This is why I hate having so many siblings!!”

  
“Why? Because we’re about to keep you from getting your nuts cut off, you dumb fuck?” Koji snorted sarcastically.  
  
Rolling his eyes, Tony sat in a chair, “…Look, I know it’s wrong--”  
  
“No, no, no” Nelly interrupted, holding up his hand, “That is the least helpful way to start an excuse, punk.”  
  
“You guys have a whole freakin’ harem and you’re gonna lecture me?!”  
  
Koji smacked his hand into the other, glaring, “We. Don’t. Give. Them. Titles. The second I have a _girlfriend,_ my dick’s occupied property, dumbass, until otherwise _vacated_.”  
  
Wow. Shin squeezed the bridge of his nose as Tony pouted, shuffling his feet, “L-Look, I like _both_ of them but neither of them are going to not let me give ‘titles’.”  
  
“So your answer to this is thus to give them both titles that they both think only one of them has” Nelly said dryly.  
  
“I don’t know what to do! I don’t want to decide!”  
  
Koji exchanged a glance with him, his brow raised. Well, this was different. “…Tony.”  
  
“What-t-t-t-t?” he dragged, rolling his eyes.   
  
God, teenagers. Shin glared, “…I’ll call my first call for being back: we’ll let you play this out. You’ve never been the kid we could just tell things to, you have to get the lesson on your own. And after you get that lesson, though, I want you to know you’re fair game for an ass whooping if you deceive any other human being because you’re selfish and for your gain going forward, you understand me?”  
  
Tony looked shocked. Seriously, people made terrible decisions. Swallowing, Tony got to his feet, his eyes narrowed, “…Well, I won’t get caught _anyway_.”  
  
“I don’t care what the hell happens, do you understand me?”  
  
“…Yes.”  
  
He stalked into the house, slamming the door behind him like _he_ was being wronged. Nelly scratched his head, singing, “Dunno how I like that call, Sgt. Yagami.”  
  
“Private” Shin snorted, “And you know it’s true.”  
  
“We also know Taiko has some angry ass older brothers similar to ourselves that will beat Tony’s ass before we even get a chance to. And, at that point, what can we do? It’s the same exact thing I’d do in their place” Koji sighed gravely.  
  
Shin smirked widely, “You won’t even let our sister date unless the boy confesses to us, three rather tall hulking individuals, he has a libido.”  
  
“Yea, and the second he double crossed _my_ precious sister, I’d _cut him_.”  
  
Nelly snickered, shaking his head, “Welcome back, Shin.”  
  
…No place like home.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _“…Fuck.”  
  
He probably couldn’t account for having ever heard his dad mutter a strong profanity like that so Shin was sincerely caught off guard. When the man got home around midnight, he asked if he had it in him to come on a drive with him. Shin was exhausted but he was still pretty amped up about being back in Japan so he agreed. His dad drove him to a diner in Subami and they got a cup of tea. His dad asked…what he’d seen.  
  
Shin disclosed the part that stayed strapped to his every other thought: the body parts distributed across rooms. He told Komari to clarify if he was just crazy but she had whispered ‘That fucking eye room, Shin. That shit was evil incarnate in one room’. It was. It…was literally dismantling a person’s body and hanging it up to terrify someone into disclosing something and taking that same limb when they didn’t.   
  
His dad shivered, taking a sip of his tea after Shin disclosed this atrocity. He’d fallen silent and Shin had said too much. His father tried to save people, he didn’t need to hear about separated body parts.   
  
“…A guy I knew…”  
  
Shin looked up, startled, as his father started…and stopped. What? “…Yes, papa? What about the guy?”  
  
“…A guy…I knew…”  
  
All he could be was alarmed as his dad almost started to shake. What the hell? “Dad, dad, it’s cool. Whatever you’re trying to tell me, it’s fine. I-I’m sorry I told you about that. It’s awful, I should have kept it to myself.”  
  
“No” Yamada hissed. He sounded angry. “No. I don’t want you to keep anything like that to yourself.”  
  
Yamada set the cup down, folding his hands and tapping them against his forehead, “…A guy…I knew…”  
  
God, was it his namesake? That man was the worst person ever, why?? His father just sat there with his forehead pressed to his hands for at least ten minutes. Finally, he murmured. “Me. I’m the guy.”  
  
“…Eh?”  
  
“A month before you were born, I— **I** saw a room full of blood. Dozens of dead bodies ripped apart by machine guns—shot out light bulbs, blood streaming down glass. It was just like an ocean of life…just pouring out…in that one room, that one place. I—I have nightmares to this very. Fucking. Day. And you—you weren’t ever supposed to see something like that” he choked.  
  
…Shit. “Dad, I-I can’t imagine how you felt seeing something like that. It’s…it’s chasing me in my dreams too, I can’t lie, and I…I think it’ll stick with me for some time. Just…I couldn’t save THOSE people but I…I’m finding solace in the fact that I did save a lot of people from seeing that same fate. I’m not okay but I’m…I’m going to be.”  
  
“…Good. Good” he whispered.  
  
Clearing his throat, he dropped his hands, his face a bit red. That…that took a lot for him to talk about. “I…I guess it’s weird it was so easy for me to talk about.”  
  
Yamada shook his head, “I hoped—prayed that my children were able to open up to me. I want you to be able to talk to me, Shin—all of you. About anything. I…I didn’t have that. And even when I did, when your mother came into my life, I just couldn’t bear to put that burden on her. That door…I don’t want it to be closed on you all. Not again.”  
  
Wincing, Shin nodded glumly, “…He seems in high spirits, like he’s doing well.”  
  
“Koji will do well in everything he aspires to” Yamada smiled, “He’s…odd but he’s a very good kid. At times I wonder if your mother was right, just…it feels like a ticking time bomb.”  
  
Yea… “Well, hopefully he settles down, makes a good name for himself, maybe get a wife if that…free spirit of his dies down” Shin drawled, drinking.  
  
Yamada smiled more, “What about you? Any thoughts on that?”  
  
“Oh, no, I…I probably wouldn’t. I can’t see putting a wife through this sort of strife I’m living” he smiled some.  
  
Shin saw it in his father’s eyes. He wanted to ask if the truth was Shin wasn’t over Lyla and what she’d done to him. No, not even slightly. More so now given how much trust he had in another woman he literally just met. Granted, Komari could betray it, it was just human nature as a whole, just…he expected…so much more from Lyla.  
  
Oh well, he’d…he’d stay out of that domain. Three months wasn’t any time to get caught up in anything like that._

“Try this.”  
  
“No night…has ever gone well for me when you said that so that’ll be a ‘no’.”  
  
Yagami Koji grinned as he set two cups of blue alcohol on the table they were occupying at a club near his university. Nelly laughed, settling in the seat next to his miscreant twin with his own cup. “It’s going to be all the rage, Shin: it’s called _Hpnotiq_.”  
  
Which sounded like a terrible, terrible name. Shin made a face, picking up the blue drink and sipping it. Huh. “…That’s not terrible which means it’s sneaky and I’ll wake up naked in another country drinking with you pricks.”  
  
Snickering, Koji waved his hand and shook his head, “Nah, man, it’s definitely not 151 or Everclear. It can mess you up though but not off one cup. Did you get to drink overseas?”  
  
Shin nodded, sipping cautiously, “They have this drink called arak. It’s different.”  
  
“Oh man, that’s so cool” Nelly sighed, “After our Euro trip, I’m ready for some traveling in my life. It was awesome.”  
  
“How was mom’s show…? I really wanted to be there” Shin murmured.  
  
Koji smiled, “Awesome enough she’ll be back and you’ll get another chance.”  
  
“Great” Shin sighed, relieved.   
  
When he looked to the dance floor area below them, he raised a brow as someone seemed to be…yelling a song. He made out in English that was giving a very bold demand to ‘shake ya’ ass’ but to also ‘watch yourself’. “Huh. Things got a little wild out here, I see.”  
  
Nelly laughed, “Rap is definitely holding no punches right now.”  
  
“Hell, there’s a second dude named Nelly now” Koji teased.  
  
Nelly stuck out his tongue before smiling deviously. Oh no. “So whadd’ya think, onii-san? Gonna get your dick wet tonight?”  
  
“ _No_.”  
  
Koji smiled, drawling, “Well, _I_ might.”  
  
“Go wild” Shin droned, “I might get a couple more drinks and take a taxi home if I don’t see you guys come back.”  
  
Both Nelly and Koji sulked at that but Shin still wasn’t particularly big on clubs, especially now that he was alone without…  
  
…Whatever, Shin. He sighed, drinking and gazing off into space after the two ventured off. He’d been home for a few days now. His teenage younger siblings tried to hang in there with him but, well, they wanted to be out and about too now. So, he caught up on sleep, music, and some television. In the scheme of things, half a year wasn’t _too_ bad? The kids still looked the same except Jill was a bit taller. The music was the same, just some miscellaneous albums. It…was actually a little comforting.  
  
“Hello!”  
  
Shin looked up, jolting, when a young woman in a yellow mid-drift and low-rise dark wash jeans appeared, holding two beers. Eh? “U-Um, hello.”  
  
“I’m Naomi. Your brothers sent me over so you don’t look like a loser, their words, not mine.”  
  
Leering in the two’s direction, finding them waving at him from their positions grinding on girls on the floor below, Shin drawled, “…Um, Naomi, that’s…nice but I’m not…really looking for that sort of…thing right now.”  
  
“You think just because a girl approaches your table they’re looking to get screwed?” she gawked.  
  
Holy _crap_. “Uh!! Uh, I-I’m so sorry, oh my God, you’re right” he blurted, feeling panic. Jesus, dummy, she didn’t say anything like that!  
  
“I’m pulling your leg. Nelly specifically sent me to suck your dick.”  
  
Shin groaned loudly, burying his face in his hands as she laughed, taking the seat across from him. “Relax, I know how off the cuff your brothers are. Anyone in the military has to be in another realm of discipline from those two.”  
  
“God, tell me about it” he droned, dragging his fingers.  
  
She handed him one of the Heineken bottles, “Well, I come in peace, just curious about the one brother I didn’t get to meet yet.”  
  
“Oh, uh, yes. Shin” he introduced, shaking her hand, “You go to school with one of those idiots?”  
  
“I actually went to high school with them the last few months. I transferred in last minute when I came to take care of my aunt who was pregnant in Subami. I’m originally from this place called Tsuyukasa, it’s near Tadaoka.”  
  
Ah! “Really? My roommate in the army is from there.”  
  
“Yea-a-a, one reason I jumped on that opportunity. No offense to you or your choice, it’s an incredibly brave thing to do, but in our area, that’s like one of two available things for you to do aside from just leaving. You probably had a few comrades from there, maybe even my brother. What’s your roommate’s name?” Naomi asked.  
  
“Yamada Komari.”  
  
Naomi looked startled. “…Oh really? That’s crazy.”  
  
Shin raised a brow, sipping his beer, “Is it?”  
  
“Yea, if you met her…friend, Kasumi, you’d know just how crazy that is” she drawled.  
  
Oh yea… “Oh, I gotcha. I haven’t met her yet but Komari told me all about her. Sounds like a…very interesting individual.”  
  
Naomi scoffed, relaxing her arm over the top of the booth, “’Interesting’, my ass. I don’t know what you call her. A piece of work, maybe.”  
  
‘Interesting’. Shin leaned in, frowning, “To be honest, I told Komari she sounds very possessive and manipulative. She…told me some things about the guys she was friends with and how Kasumi has them…handled. I wasn’t a fan of the…thought process.”  
  
She smiled. She had dark brown hair cut to her neck and pretty honey-colored eyes. He guessed he’d concede she was cute. “Sounds like you two got very close for her to disclose _that_ , Shin.”  
  
“Oh, I dunno about _that_ , we just ran into one of the poor guys subjected to it in Baghdad. Mako, I believe?”  
  
Naomi’s eyebrows furrowed. Eh? “…Yea, that’s my older brother.”  
  
… _Wow_. “Wow…the world really is quite small” he replied, amazed.  
  
She snapped her fingers, gasping, “He called me and told me he saw Komari cuddled up with some guy at a bar a while back! That was you!”  
  
“Woah, woah, _cuddled up_?” Shin demanded, holding up his hands, “It was a semi-loud bar and she was leaning in to explain the situation to me, we were _not_ cuddling. I don’t know what to make of this Kasumi yet but I’m not a homewrecker.”  
  
Granted, she had cuddled him in bed that once but he was falling apart and about to lose his mind. Naomi tilted her head knowingly, “I could see that. But, y’know, you get too close, you heard what happened with my brother. You might find yourself in a live-action interactive cuckhold porn.”  
  
“Absolutely not.”  
  
“Well, in the alternate universe where you do, I hope you mess her up. I couldn’t believe how much neither of them cared about my brother’s feelings but I was definitely pissed at Komari. Mako thinks the world of her and they unsettled him” she grunted.  
  
While he really wanted to defend Komari in that vein, he realized she…was kind of going along with it? But… “Not to make excuses for her but she said Kasumi is…very convincing?”  
  
Naomi’s brows quirked as she drank her beer, swallowing with a sigh, “Yea, I can’t lie, Kasumi is like some kind of savant master version of reverse psychology. She’ll convince you that you wanted it, that you consented to it, and that it’s all your fault. And it takes a while to dismantle her logic. Sincerely, sometimes I _do_ think she’s right.”  
  
Shin was appalled. “But it’s not right to _do_. Her girlfriend might find men attractive _too_ but she’s committed to _her_. Yea, Komari told me it was _kind of_ a turn on but it sounded like she was still more into Kasumi’s response to it rather than her own. If you have a devoted person, why would you get caught up in what _could_ happen instead of protecting what _is_ happening? And why guys? Komari could be attracted to a whole other woman but it doesn’t sound like she makes Komari sleep with them in front of her.”  
  
“Not to my knowledge…” Naomi mused.  
  
“It’s not acceptable. If it was a guy who managed to convince his girlfriend to sleep with another guy in front of him to prove only he gets her off, it’d be toxic as hell. Just because the genders are changed doesn’t make it more agreeable” he grunted.  
  
With a wink, she crossed her legs, “Just be careful, Yagami-san-n-n. You sound like a candidate in the running right now.”  
  
Meh. She leaned forward, blinking, “I know from Mako that you can’t disclose much but…is it bad over there? Like really bad?”  
  
“Well…yes and no. It wasn’t quite the chaos I thought it’d be but when it _does_ become chaotic, it’s pretty bad.”  
  
She nodded solemnly, her chin rested in her palms, “…I worry about Mako. He’s in communications but, y’know, I think the Zechs might get sick of the intrusion one day and just start attacking. They have a goal and a lot of people are just getting in their way, from their standpoint. At some point, they’re gonna wanna take care of the middleman.”  
  
“And we’ll be ready for them” Shin assured.  
  
“I hope they stop soon. I…I don’t know what I’d do if something happened to Mako.”  
  
Shin frowned, confused. “What level of communications is he in? I mean, it’s unlikely that he’ll be harmed unless they attack our base and barracks and at that point, it’s just a suicide attempt.”  
  
“The lines. He…runs the cables for the pop up camps in enemy territory.”  
  
…Oh shit. Staring, Shin tried to find…words of solace. Alas, that poor guy literally had to depend on other people to keep him covered while he was out in the open making sure they could get into contact with other bases potentially during a firefight. Naomi smiled wearily, “It’s okay. I know he’s in danger.”  
  
“I mean, just-just hope for the best, okay? I-I felt a lot better when my family was so optimistic and spreading that to me, y’know?” Shin suggested.  
  
She nodded, tilting her head, “You want another drink?”  
  
“Eh? Oh, uh, sure. Here, get yourself something too” he blurted, pulling out some pieces.  
  
“Now I thought you _weren’t_ trying to get some, Mr. Yagami” she teased, standing, “I’ll be right back.”  
  
…Well, time wasn’t promised to any of them but he…just hoped that Mako would be okay. He hoped…he hoped the guy saw getting a drink with his old friend that had an overbearing girlfriend…

For the briefest moment, his mind had gone there but he immediately rebuked himself, bitterness making his chest feel hollow. No, fuck that.  
  
Naomi returned with two glasses of…something green and two shots. She grinned, settling one of the glasses in front of him with the clear shot, “You gotta try this.”  
  
“…Y’know, Naomi? May I call you Naomi as I have been for the last fifteen minutes?”  
  
“Yea” she laughed.  
  
“Trying things with alcohol has never gone well for me” Shin said simply.  
  
She laughed more, taking her shot, “This may shock and amaze you, but, I have slept with your brothers before and man, alcohol in their bloodstream turns them into certified nymphos.”  
  
“ _More_ than they already are?” he gawked.  
  
Naomi giggled, “They just become very…thorough and very domineering.”  
  
…Oh. Must be a Yagami thing then, weird. Shin took the shot, finding it was probably Smirnoff or something. “…You can not answer if it’s TMI as it’s actually TMI for _me_ but…do they…double team you?”  
  
She shook her head, “They won’t.”  
  
“…Wha?”  
  
“Koji and Nelly, they don’t do threesomes together. A lot of girls tried and try to convince them but they’re both adamantly against it. Now, I’ve seen them have sex _separately_ in the same room and I can…personally attest they’ll swap but like them working together? Nope” Naomi explained, shrugging.  
  
That was hella news to him. Shin analyzed the drink, uncertain what unholy mixture would create this Cell from Dragon Ball Z color. “That’s surprising to learn, I just knew they’d…do some kinky shit like that.”  
  
“Oh, they’re freaks, don’t let me steer you that direction, but they’re apparently not _that_ scenario freaky. I guess it comes off a little incestuous.”  
  


He couldn’t help laugh, shaking his head, “Yea, it _does,_ still just surprised that struck them that way. You’ll recall one of them sent you over here to their brother.”  
  
“Aww, they just want to make sure their big bubby isn’t lonely.”  
  
Tuh, lonely…maybe. Or maybe just _crazy_ because he tasted _whatever_ that drink was and actually found it kind of strangely tasty? He asked Naomi what it was and she said the bartender was ‘keeping it secret’ because a guy in the U.S. was trying to trademark the cocktail but wanted to hear what people in different markets thought. Well, it was damn good, just would be nice to know _what’s in it_. But, of course, at some point, given he’d had the Hpnotiq, a beer, a shot of vodka, and one mystery drink, he was happy to entertain another when she offered…  
  
Naomi was drinking hers, now sitting directly beside him as he felt kind of…loose after his third Cell from DBZ drink. She smiled at him, pushing a piece of hair from his face. “I was surprised…how’d you end up with blue eyes?”  
  
“Our ol’ man…” he droned, “They’re hideous, right?”  
  
“No way…I think they’re gorgeous.”  
  
“That’s…what she said too…”  
  
“Who?”  
  
“…Doesn’t matter.”  
  
He blinked languidly at her when she stroked his leg to his inner thigh, purring, “You sure you’re not interested, Shin-san? I can take care of you for the night.”  
  
He really wasn’t. His…encounters since he became active were hinged on him having known the woman longer than a few hours while drunk. He liked to build something of a bond.  
  
…He’d known her for thirteen years.  
  
Pursing his lips, sucking his cheek, Shin shrugged. “Sure, what the hell?”  
  
She seemed vaguely surprised before taking his hand, leading him toward an inner portion of the club. Somehow he found himself realizing he was _not_ doing this in a bathroom. He had his limits. However, she opened to what looked like a broom closet which was…slightly better?  
  
Shin leaned against the door at her direction, honestly just an entire novice at this whole function of public sex with pretty much a stranger. He gazed down as she got on her knees, unzipping his pants.  
  
“Oh wow, I wasn’t expecting that.”  
  
Couldn’t say he’d had that particular reaction before. Shin raised a brow as she stroked his length, “What…?”  
  
“Well, Nelly and Koji are circumcised…”  
  
As was Tony. The sons born while his mother was forcibly married to that bastard were circumcised because of some tradition of that house. He and Shaun were not because, well, his dad saw no reason to? “Parents rolled a coin. The twins lost.”  
  
She laughed, shaking her head, pulling the flesh over the head of his cock, “You’re a mysterious bunch, I know that much.”  
  
Their history was a bit unusual. Shin closed his eyes as she kind of nibbled at the head, kissing and tonguing before running her tongue down his shaft. It’d…definitely been a while.  
  
He rasped as she ducked down, sucking and occasionally humming. Fuck. Shin grunted as she pulled away after some minutes, stroking him with a pout. “I can never get you boys to come and I get compliments on my head skills. What’s the deal?”  
  
“Oh, you did great” Shin assured, pulling her to stand.  
  
How weird, he almost chuckled, undoing the belt holding up her jeans. This was the first time he recalled having sex with someone wearing pants. She giggled as he kissed her neck, reaching down and running his finger over her clit. “So head isn’t endgame for you either.”  
  
“It can be” he whispered, “But it’s been a while, y’know?”  
  
She whimpered as he moved her yellow panties aside, pushing his fingers into her dampening sex. Good, he needed a little slip. She helped him pull the jeans off, yanking and stepping out of underwear as well. It caught him off guard but she kissed him hard, running her tongue against his. It’d been a while since he’d been kissed either…  
  
…Okay. Naomi yelped loudly, hugging his shoulders, when he dry lifted her off the ground by the back of her thighs. Well, if Koji was all buffed up for this particular ‘skill’, he guessed he ought to put his muscles to good use too.  
  
“A-Ah!” she choked as he pushed inside of her pussy.  
  
Grasping her ass, he rolled his pelvis and pulled her down hard on his cock. She moaned, rasping ‘fuck’ with each push, his pace speeding up as he fell into rhythm.   
  
One thing was for sure, it was a way more tiring position, even if she did weigh like a hundred pounds tops. Leaning her back against the wall, she buried her fingers in his hair as he thrust without abandon with the added leverage. He…he couldn’t lie, it felt good as hell.  
  
She squeezed his shoulders, her eyes shutting tight while she bit her lip, her sex shuddering and convulsing as he pulled out, coming…on the ground, holy shit. He’d never go into a broom closet again, disgusting.   
  
While it lacked all sense, he set her on a box of paper towels to recover, grabbing one of said rolls of towels to…correct his error. Naomi laughed breathily, her chest heaving, “T-That’s very conscientious of you. I like it.”  
  
“I can’t imagine making someone…ugh. No.”  
  
She put her clothes back on after a few minutes and she’d caught her breath, running her fingers through her sweaty hair, “Well, maybe next time we can get a hotel so you won’t have to worry about that.”  
  
‘Next time’? He was frankly a little startled as she kissed him, pulling away and walking out, winking, “Just if you’re ever feeling…frustrated.”  
  
“O-Oh. U-Um, sure” he shook his head, dizzy, “W-Well, wait, where are you going? I’ll walk you home.”  
  
“I’m actually right across the street” she grinned, “If I’d known you were all such a universally good ride, I’d have taken you home with me.”  
  
Shin flustered, walking with her to the door of the club regardless to see her go to an apartment building across the street. She did give him her cell phone number before she departed. What…  
  
…What did he just do? That wasn’t him.  
  
Groaning, he ran his fingers through his hair, just wanting to shower and go to bed now. He turned to grab his phone and call a taxi. His hand almost dropped to the knife he kept in his back pocket but found himself leering instead. One Yagami Koji had mysteriously appeared in the darkest alley, smoking a cigarette, staring at him absently. “Y’know, _phantom menace_ , one day you _will_ get your ass kicked sneaking around like that.”  
  
“They want it, they can get it” Koji assured.  
  
“Crazy ass. Where’s Nelly?”  
  
Koji shrugged, “Hooked up with some chick that wanted him to go home with her and her friends.”  
  
Crossing his arms, Shin’s eyes narrowed, “…And you didn’t want to go with?”  
  
“Nah, I got a little swivel head and figured I was placated for the night.”  
  
Shin just stared at Koji who took steady puffs silently. Koji was such a weird guy. Granted, while he would offer Nelly and anyone around them that smoked a cigarette from his stash, as Shin insisted he was going to quit, Koji made it a point not to offer and even gave him nicotine patches instead. He was…supportive.  
  
Taking his pack out regardless, figuring he’d drowned his liver already, he lit up as well and muttered, “Well, I’m ‘placated’ too so if you’re ready to go…”  
  
Koji nodded, leading Shin back up the street to presumably his dorm. They just smoked and walked in silence for a while before Koji said slowly, “So, how was it?”  
  
“…How was what?”  
  
“With Naomi.”  
  
Shin made a face, feeling…awkward. “I-I mean, she was really nice, really easy to talk to. We actually have a whole lot of outside things in common. It was a…good matchup.”  
  
His brother smirked some at him, “We weren’t expecting you to marry her, Shin. She get your rocks off?”  
  
“…Yea.”  
  
Koji fell silent and Shin instantly felt annoyed, possibly because it was two o’clock in the morning and he was tired and drunk. Also, because… “I can’t believe you’re still holding out hope. Stop it. She made her decision and I never want to see her again.”  
  
“I know, Shin. Can’t I be sad about that though?”  
  
Eyes widening as they came to a dorm where Koji punched in a few numbers on a keypad, Shin swallowed, silently following Koji in.  
  
Could Koji be sad that, nine months ago, Shin would not have been having spontaneous stranger sex in a broom closet with someone that had admittedly slept through two of his brothers? Could he be sad that thirteen years of friendship was wrecked for essentially no reason? Could _Koji_ be sad that that pinnacle of his life crashed into the pit of hell and he had nowhere to go but forward?  
  
Sure. He…he was just going to move forward for these three months and maybe have a little fun. Perhaps it wasn’t his nature but so be it.  
  
…It did seem sad.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Yagami Shin might have done okay in college.

  
He stayed with Koji for a little bit after the club. To his somewhat shock, he discovered that Nelly spent an exorbitant amount of time coming to visit. His school was like an hour and a half or more away meaning he was spending almost four hours to get here. Koji just shrugged when Shin pointed this out. _“He’ll get over it when he gets his grades.”  
  
_ Great. Meanwhile, Koji left him a few times to study so Shin ended up hanging out with the twin’s longtime friend, Motosuwa Keiba, and the new guy, Domon. He was pretty cool, also from another affluent area in Japan. He joked that he had never met anyone quite like Koji or Nelly in his neighborhood though. Oh, and he probably never would. Shin realized after a little while though that he hadn’t heard Koji mention his best friend, Ueda “Corey” Kurou in ages. Keiba shrugged, _“I asked Koji too but he won’t give me any details. Sounds like they had a thing.”_

Koji had known Kurou a _long time_ to fall out over ‘a thing’. Shin had tried to ask him himself but Koji avoided the topic like certain death. What even? Did…did best friendships even mean anything?  
  
In the meantime, he got to go to a few college parties because Koji was a balance of discipline and shenanigans that defied all sense. Naomi came to one and while it didn’t get to the exact level it did that first night, it got a little…steamy. The next party, he was doing keg stands and playing beer pong and in his drunken stupor, he might have seen her go off with another guy entirely. He wasn’t actually sure how Koji and Nelly did it? He was honestly a little hurt.  
  
 _“Dummy. You don’t get feelings for fuck buddies”_ Koji advised.  
  
The hell? “ _So you screw her with absolutely no feelings?”  
  
“I mean, I’m going to make sure she’s fed if she comes to me hungry, make sure she’s not suffering if she comes to me sad, and make sure she’s safe if I see her in danger but that’s because I’m a decent human being in SOME respects. What I’m not going to do is get upset if I see her fucking another guy. There’s no titles, remember?”  
  
_That was a tough one to swallow. Like, didn’t it seem as if she wasn’t…satisfied with them alone? _“That would be the point, onii-san. Maybe the free bird style of sex isn’t for you.”  
  
_ Probably not, he was way too possessive, apparently. Koji had snorted, “ _If she was my girl, then, uh, yea, I’d have issues with her sleeping with another guy. But are you saying you want to give Naomi a title?”  
  
_ …Actually, no. He didn’t want to give Naomi a ‘title’ at all. Strange, he was starting to sound as selfish as Tony, wow. Koji had snickered and told him just to consider Naomi for ‘stress purposes’. Oh, okay, sure. No, that…that was about the only deviance he was going to dally in and he was considering that dead too. Just…a little too promiscuous for his personal taste.  
  


The rest of the stay was fun. Koji took him to the arcade and introduced him to ‘Guitarfreaks’. Just like DDR, he once again found himself doing something real world like, playing a toy guitar to match a song. It was surprisingly fun though…maybe he’d get a PS2 when he got home. Or steal Tony’s since he was apparently more interested in playing a different kind of game right now.  
  
On Tuesday, he went to one of Koji’s lectures with him, something like biology or something he’d never consider his business major brother requiring at this point. However, it was a little more…exciting than high school had been. A lot more interactive with the automated machine queuing questions to answer and the lively professor gushing anecdotes as well as science. Huh…maybe he hadn’t given this a fair shake.  
  
Once they got out, reconsidering his life choices for that brief moment, he jumped when his cell phone rang. He forgot about that, he hadn’t had one in so long. Taking it from his pocket as he walked beside Koji to his next lecture, he found the screen indicating it was their dad. Oh? Clicking the green phone button, he pressed it to his ear, “Hello…?”  
  
“Hello, _son_. Must be having a great time out there, I wasn’t expecting you to stay for five whole days” Yamada said dryly.  
  
Shin snickered, rubbing his eye, “Well, it is a little exciting…”  
  
“That’s fine, I want you relaxing and taking a load off. Just you’re not here for very long and your mom and I would very much like to spend time with you too.”  
  
…Yea. He would be back in the desert, mostly alone, very soon. And this time it wasn’t for six months, he was gone for a full year. Swallowing, he nodded, “You’re right. I’m going to come back tonight. Uh, maybe a late dinner?”  
  
“Sounds good, I’ll let you know when your mother and I are cleared up. Really though, enjoy yourself.”  
  


“Nn. See you soon, dad.”  
  
Koji snorted as he stopped outside of a building, hundreds of other students pushing past, “I’m trying to imagine dad calling to say he missed _me_ , favorite.”  
  
“Go somewhere for half a year and see what happens” Shin scoffed.  
  
Surprisingly, Koji looked off. What? “Uh, _are you_?”  
  
“…Not right now” he shrugged, “…I was considering it for graduate school though. Mom was considering going to New York Fashion Week next and I went with her for a week in January. I got to visit some campuses over there too and I can’t say I’m not intrigued.”

  
Frowning, Shin crossed his arms, “Well, that sounds like an awesome idea, Koji. Down the road too? It should be fine.”  
  
“Yea…you just make sure you keep coming back in one piece.”  
  
Shin’s eyes widened as Koji glanced at his watch, “Domon’s at the dorm if you want to get your stuff and head back. You know how flighty mom and dad’s schedule can be.”  
  
“Ah, right…well, I take it I won’t see _you_ for a while then” Shin drawled.  
  
“Nah, I’ll come this weekend and have dinner or brunch or something” Koji stretched, “Oh, and in March, I’m taking Jill to see Marilyn Manson with me. You should come.”  
  
What now? “Marilyn…Manson. That…really strange creepy guy with the creeper vibes?” Shin droned.  
  
Koji grinned, “Sure?”  
  
“I’ll go just to make sure nothing happens to Jill” Shin leered.  
  
“The fuck am _I_ there for? Granted, I’ll be listening to the music but I can kick ass to a soundtrack if I have to.”  
  
Shin laughed at that, shaking his head, “Yea, I definitely _do not_ doubt that but I’ll come as backup. Nice if you would consider going to some _not_ crazy hard rock concerts while I’m here too.”  
  
“Pearl Jam didn’t announce a tour for this year, Soundgarden is still broken up, and even the Red Hot Chili Peppers aren’t coming around” Koji said with a yawn, “Might have to give it up for a little while, bro.”  
  
Bleh. Patting his brother’s shoulder, he wandered away to the dorm. Domon let him in on his way out to get something to eat, advising he hoped he came around again soon. Probably. He actually had to go for basic training one weekend of each month until he left and it was only about twenty minutes from here. Couldn’t have him losing his edge, after all.  
  
Some girls giggled as he walked past to get to some form of public transport, looking toward him. What? Smiling at them, confused, they giggled more and ran a little faster toward a school building. What? He wasn’t used to society anymore. Speaking of…  
  
He half expected the number given to him not to work, that she was generally just tolerating his presence the whole time. Alas, he smiled when the voice on the other end connected. “Is that you, Blue Eyes? Couldn’t stand a week without hearing my gorgeous voice?” Komari sang.  
  
“Yea, just had to see if you were staying out of trouble between now and June.”  
  
“I haven’t left my _house_ since we got home there, partner. We are all business in the sheets here.”  
  
Shin raised a brow, curious, “Like, she’s next to you right now?”  
  
“Nah, she ran out to get some groceries. She’s been all gleeful so I probably will not take a…masculine call in her presence until we get to the end of this venture.”  
  
Rolling his eyes, Shin noticed a bus board indicating it was going to Shiro Station which was near Wasaba…close enough. Going over to wait for it, he drawled, “Yea, can’t have her thinking I’m shafting you from afar, I guess?”  
  
“What can I say, man? She’s wild. Speaking of shafting though, you got laid?”  
  
Shin smirked some, glancing off, “Yea. And, actually, it was Mako’s sister.”  
  
“What now?”  
  
“The guy we ran into at Baghdad, the one you were awkward around. His sister.”  
  
Komari inhaled. “You slept with _Naomi_? Wh-What? How are you _around_ Naomi? I thought you lived in Subami!”  
  
“My brother goes to school here in Saitama” he explained, drawling, “She’s very…knowing of them?”  
  
Komari was dead silent. Oops, was this weird? She finally groaned, “Sorry, I mean…she’s like a kid sister to me so I guess I’m a little shocked she’s…slinging.”  
  
“You’re like three years older than she is” Shin raised a brow.  
  
“She’s still a kid!! Keep your dick out of her!”  
  
He chuckled, “And you said _I_ was the protective older brother, nee-san. But don’t worry, I’m feeling some kind of way about being that…open, even if it only happened twice.”  
  
“Um, da’ fuck? I thought you were on some sort of sex vacation for days. Go back and hit it at least three more times _then_ I’ll tell you to keep your dick out of her.”  
  
Shin laughed despite himself, shaking his head, “Just real special, Yamada.”  
  
The bus pulled toward the stop and he sighed, glancing at his watch, “Well, I’m about to get on the bus. You keep busy being tantric, I guess?”  
  
Komari was grinning, he could tell. “Try it, you’ll probably be surprised.”  
  
“Tuh, yea right. I’ll talk to you later.”  
  
Climbing onto the bus, Shin quietly took a spot near the front after paying his fare, popping some Soundgarden into his portable CD player and closing his eyes. He asked Nelly and Koji one night when they were playing Uno at the latter’s dorm if either of them ever imagined someone like Naomi as a little more than a ‘friend with benefits’. Koji shook his head, “ _The person my imagination conjures for a wife is both supportive and someone I can mesh with AND insta-bone.”  
  
_ Insta _what_? Nelly had laughed, _“So you want mental stimulation and physical stimulation? Good luck.”  
  
_ …He…had had that.  
  
Shin glowered, opening his eyes to gaze out of the window. He… _had_ had that. He thought.  
  
When he got off in Wasaba the hour later, it was about 3 o’clock. There was no way his parents were going to be done any time soon so he supposed he could wander there for a few. He went to his former place of employment to see Ose. The man smacked his back, declaring that he was ‘built like a tank’ now. Really? Maybe. He laughed when he was offered a job once a week… ‘sure’, Shin shrugged. Might help him stay in shape.  
  
Once again, he found himself walking past a group of girls who stared at him, unabashed. He must’ve looked crazy? It couldn’t be his fashion, he was literally wearing a white t-shirt and jeans with a leather jacket, was this not a solid look anymore?   
  
“Hey, pretty boy, try to save some for us regular shmucks.”  
  
Shin’s eyes widened, startled, and came to a stop. Glancing over his shoulder, he almost gasped. “Joe!”  
  
Akiyama “Joe” Jyou grinned, wearing camo bottoms and a white v-neck with a green bomber jacket as he approached, walking up the sidewalk, also pretty buffed up and huge. “Oh, so you just figured I was talking to you, man?”  
  
“Shut up” Shin stuck out his tongue, shaking his hand, “What’s going on? You being deployed?”  
  
“Not yet, shit got complicated, I got pulled to do an inter-service transfer.”  
  
 _What_? “What-What do you _mean_? You know how _rare_ that is?” Shin demanded.  
  
Joe waved him on, stuffing his hands into his pockets, speaking lowly, “…What’s your involvement level right now?”  
  
“I’ve…killed sixteen Zech soldiers saving Terrans. Is that involved enough?” he muttered.  
  
It sounded bitter but Joe didn’t seem to mind. “Those son of a bitches are fucking crazy. I know you’re a good person, Shin, but people that do what they do? They don’t deserve your sympathy.”  
  
…Damn. “…Right.”  
  
“Small island out in the middle of nowhere, sitting a little below and between Africa and Australia. Intel got reports that the Zechs are gonna start routing captives through near Yemen and getting them to that island via submarines. And your boy here has the strongest set of lungs they’d ever seen, according to the powers that be so I’m being sent to the Marines” Joe winked.  
  
… _Wait a minute_. Shin grabbed Joe’s shoulder, stopping him. “… _Joe._ ”  
  
“Wha?”  
  
“…How are your geography skills?”  
  
“I’m from Wasaba, Shin. Subpar as _fuck_.”  
  
Shin squeezed the bridge of his nose, feeling a hard migraine. “…Joe, it is like…thousands of kilometers and miles between Iraq and _anywhere_ near Yemen. And I’m having a hard time picturing this miscellaneous island but that’s probably _another_ thousand plus miles and kilometers. It _can’t_ be true. No one would survive that journey unless the Zechs plan to use airplanes at which point, what are the submarines for??”  
  
“Couldn’t tell you, dude. Seems like the Zechs definitely go about things the hard way” Joe shrugged  
  
“Joe-e-e!”  
  
Looking back, a black haired young woman was standing there, pouting and holding a case of beer and a black plastic bag which often denoted booze. Joe waved, “One sec, Shino! How long you back, bud?”  
  
“I leave again in June and won’t be back until next June.”  
  
Joe shook his head, “Man, long damn haul…but uh, have a favor to ask you. Might piss you off.”  
  
“…Wha?”  
  
“So-o-o, before I left the apartment for boot camp, I was taking one last smoke…and, well, while high, I put some of my buds in a floorboard underneath a rug.”  
  
Shin stared at him. “…So, if I had gotten caught…”  
  
“I would have totally taken the blame if you told them to dust for prints, all day!” Joe insisted, “However, when I got back, I wanted to retrieve my stash and went to see who has the apartment now…did you meet the person that took over?”  
  
Shin raised a brow, “…Well, I actually gave it over to one of my dad’s old Wasaba friend’s daughter. Nesha or something like that. Dunno if she stayed.”  
  
“Br-o-o-o” Joe sang, shaking his head in amazement, “If it _is,_ when I went to knock, I have never had a boner that fast in my _life,_ I almost _fainted_.”  
  
Smirking, Shin blinked languidly, “As much as you love women, Joe, dunno how much that is actually saying.”  
  
“Dude! It can’t be the same girl then, you’d have to be _blind_ to not recall how hot this one is!”  
  
“Uh huh…so, what happened? You get your weed?”  
  
“Nope” Joe droned, “I asked her to have my children without thinking and she threatened to rip my scrotum off so I ran.”  
  
He was surrounded with the most interesting yet insane people. Shin sighed, “…So you want me to go retrieve your weed for you.”  
  
“If you can! And I definitely want to meet back up with you so we can hang out, dude, so you can give me the run down on what to expect out there. For right now though? Gotta run! Your number’s the same, right?”  
  
Shin nodded and Joe smacked his shoulder hard, “You’re the greatest, Shin! I’ll call you tomorrow.”  
  
“Kay…”  
  
What a weirdo. Shin blew into his hands as he headed back in the direction of his old temporary apartment and former childhood place of residence. He was half tempted to call Komari and ask if she’d heard anything about this crazy plan to take the Earthmates to a freakin’ island. It made absolutely no sense!  
  
…Hmm. Though it…reminded him of _her_ , maybe there was a guy he could get some outside perspective from on that move. _Then_ he would call Komari and run it by her, so long as she wasn’t in ‘tantric’ mode with her girlfriend. He wandered up the steps, shaking his head again. Well, he guessed he was the only one not in the mood for that right now…  
  
Knocking on the door, Shin stuffed his hands into the pocket of his leather coat as he waited. Stood to reason she might not be home, it was 3:30 on a Tuesday. However, after a minute, the door opened.  
  
They actually only ever talked on the phone, the whole transaction was never made entirely in person. She sounded like a Wasabean. They had a brusque no-nonsense tone and he had felt she wasn’t going to leave him hanging. It hadn’t crossed his mind what she looked like. Alas, when she appeared, he completely…lost all thought.   
  
She…might have been about 5’6”, 167 centimeters, long curly golden tresses streaming down her back to about her waist with gorgeous verdant eyes. He had almost always made it a point not to notice things like breasts or hips first but she was wearing a white mid-drift tank top that gave his imagination the day off and a pair of low rise shorts that made absolutely _no_ sense in this weather except to show off she was a perfect hour glass of utter _glory_. And in that moment, he absolutely understood ‘insta-bone’.  
  
“…U-Uh.”  
  
“…Oh, hi. You’re Shin, right? You’re back?” she said, tilting her head at him.  
  
He was who now? Blinking rapidly, he quickly smiled, “A-Ah, yea, I’m-I’m on break. U-Um, apologies, Ne-Nesha-san, right?”  
  
“That’s me” she smiled before snickering, “And if you’re looking for the weed in the floor, I smoked that ages ago.”  
  
Weed? …Oh!! “Ah! Oh, well, yea, that’s-that’s why I was here, ha. So, t-that’s all. Take care!” he grinned nervously, bowing and starting to run away too.  
  
“Wait” Nesha frowned, “Come in. I probably have a little bit to replace it.”  
  
“O-Oh, th-that’s okay, I-I don’t want to intrude.”  
  
She shook her head, smiling, “You’re not.”  
  
…Okay. Shin cleared his throat, entering the apartment. Oh, now he got why she was dressed like it was a hot summer day, it was literally a sauna in here. Trudging off his shoes at the door, he jumped a little to find another woman sitting on the couch, wearing a green tight t-shirt and plaid shorts. She had purple hair and amber eyes, staring absently at a magazine. “Odette, this is one of my ol’ bastard dad’s old friend’s son, Yagami Shin. Shin, this is my roommate, Hakuryu Odette.”  
  
Odette nodded at him simply and he smiled awkwardly, “A-Ah, nice to meet you.”  
  
“Please, have a seat” Nesha offered the seat next to Odette.  
  
Mmkay. Sitting down out of politeness, he was feeling a little…stupid. He didn’t know anyone to talk to them or say he was trying to catch up, this was crazy. She already said his errand was gone. Odette looked up suddenly. “Wait, Yagami?”  
  
“Y-Yes?”  
  
Odette suddenly snickered. “Nothing, I just work at a bar in West Wasaba and I can’t count the number of middle-aged bitches that come in and get toasted enough to start talking about the old day’s and a Yagami’s ‘lingual’ skills from the seventies.”  
  
Shin was confused. His dad knew Japanese and English? “Lingual skills?”  
  
This perfect stranger formed a V with her fingers and proceeded to stick out her tongue between them. He stared at her for a long, long moment because absolutely nothing about anything that just occurred would settle into any formation of acceptance in his brain. “… _WHAT?”  
  
_ Nesha laughed as she walked around the kitchen, “Dang, Odette, that’s his dad. He might need a stiff drink for that sort of information.”  
  
“I need to _bleach my brain,_ you mean?”  
  
Now absolutely thrust back into reality and needing to escape whatever version of that horrid place this was, Shin started when Nesha handed him a cup. “Can I be honest with you, Shin?”  
  
“I’m not really sure how much more ‘honesty’ I can handle following that information on my dad but sure” he groaned, taking the container and staring at it. Clear so either water or liquor…  
  
“I usually don’t let random dudes into my apartment but you’re pretty fucking sexy and I’m now second guessing it because the trance is gone” she laughed again.  
  


Shin flustered but smirked. “…Honestly, I wasn’t going to come in either but might have had a similar reaction. I can leave, really. Thank you for answering.”  
  
“No, no, finish your drink first. I did invite you in, I need to practice _some_ hospitality.”  
  
…Kay. He sipped and, yep, vodka. Better finish this and run. Nesha went back to the kitchen and he noticed on the coffee table a clear bowl of those soft mints some of the old auntie’s used to have when he was kid. Smiling at the nostalgia, he cleared his throat, “U-Um, you mind if I get one of the candies?”  
  
“Oh, help yourself!” Nesha called.  
  
Picking out a pink one, he popped it in his mouth…and that was definitely not candy. Chewing and swallowing, he slowly sipped the vodka in confusion. Huh…he definitely remembered _some_ sweetness. No, no, that was definitely a medication, oops. He glanced over the table and grimaced to find there was indeed a tray of gummy bears as well. Damn, he might have taken someone’s medication! “A-Ah, I-I’m sorry, I thought these round things were mints. I think I may have taken someone’s meds, I’m sorry.”

  
Odette quickly looked up from her magazine, her eyes wide, “Oh shit, I thought we put those away.”  
  
Nesha almost ran into the room, blanching, “O-Oh shit, let me get you some water.”  
  
What? Shin was confused as Nesha brought him a tall glass of water, sitting beside him and urging him to drink it. What? Wait… “…What did I just chew up?”  
  
She groaned, squeezing her temples, “…Don’t tell the cops?”  
  
Oh _fuck_. “ _What was it_?”  
  
“E-Ecstasy” she smiled quickly.  
  
Shin guessed he was the straight edge one because he had absolutely no idea what that meant. “Should I go home and sleep it off?”  
  
“U-Um, yo-you probably won’t be able to…” Odette stammered. “U-Uh, you can try though. Just relax. Here, let me take your coat.”  
  
What? Shin made a face as they panicked and took his coat, advising him to drink the water. What was it? It wasn’t doing anything…  
  
…For about thirty minutes, that was the case, anyway. Eventually, he started to feel…very, very, very relaxed. Perhaps more relaxed than he’d ever felt in his entire existence. Kind of slumping deeper into the couch, he gazed as Nesha continued to urge him to drink more water. Her tits were right in his face. Did she have three nipples per boob? The protrusions looked that way. Staring at them as she spoke to him words he had entirely tuned out into nothingness, he drawled, “…Lemme…lemme see your tits…”  
  
“Uh, w-what?”  
  
“Leh me…lemme see your tits…”  
  
Nesha panicked, “S-Sure, if you just don’t tell the cops on us.”  
  
Cops on what? He just nodded to whatever that promise was and she quickly pulled the hem of the tank top down under the bountiful mounds. Oh shit, he’d only heard about nipple piercings, two bars pierced through rosy pink nubs. They…they were nice, he wanted to play with them. He winced as his penis was almost ripping through his jeans. What? What was this?  
  
“Oh fuck, it’s huge” Odette gasped.  
  
“It’s the pill, Odette.”  
  
Somewhere in some far region of his mind, every bit of propriety he ever had was huddled up in a drooling stupor, else he would never in his lifetime have just unzipped his pants and started fondling his cock over his boxers right in front of two strangers. It was just weird, he’d never had an erection like this…  
  
“…I mean, Nesha, he’s already taken the ex…”  
  
“ _No,_ Odette. He doesn’t even know what he took!”  
  
Shin stared as the two argued, still…maybe a little lucid? “…What are we talking about?”  
  
Nesha blushed prettily, pulling her shirt back up much to his dismay. “U-Um, u-usually we take that stuff with _willing_ partners? But you made an honest mistake and might not have a complete grasp of what’s going on so you might not exactly be willing.”  
  
Willing to…? Odette smiled, rubbing his arm, “Or you could be willing…maybe if we take some too?”  
  
“Sure, I’m free for a few hours…” For…whatever he was willing to do.  
  
The blonde groaned, pinching the bridge of her nose, “He’s _out of it,_ Odette.”  
  
Odette got one of the pills and took it, sticking out her tongue, “Then I’ll be ‘out of it’ with him, you be all nervous.”  
  
Oh, so these were drug drugs. Nesha grudgingly popped one as well, leering in Odette’s direction, “He might have a big cock, Odette, but he’s a rich kid. They typically don’t know how to use it.”  
  
“Only one way to find out.”  
  
Shin squinted, his brows furrowing. What about his penis? Did they know why it was hard like this…? He rested his neck back over the couch as they continued to argue on either side of him. This was nice, he didn’t feel any strange panic right now over what was going on out there or whether he was going to die overseas. He blinked languidly as slowly Odette started to also get calmer, curling into his side. “Hey-y-y, Yagami, are you a virgin?”  
  
“Oh no, no” he smiled, “Why do you ask…?”  
  
“Oh, just wanted to know what your experience level is…”  
  
He was confusingly not confused when she kissed him, running her hand up his chest. She gasped suddenly, pulling away and grabbing the ends of his shirt, taking it off. “You’re so muscular…”  
  
Shin frowned a bit before she started to kiss him again, running her fingers through the delves of his abs. Well, he had already had stranger sex twice so what the hell? Prepared to suggest they move to a bedroom to make this not awkward for Nesha, he felt the blonde tug his head in her direction to kiss her next. Wait, wait, was he supposed to make a choice? That was rude.  
  
Odette started to nip at his neck while Nesha continued to kiss him hard. Weird, why wasn’t Odette upset they were competing?

… _Wait a minute_. “W-Wait, wait” Shin droned, turning out of the kiss, so puzzled his head was swimming, “…W-What’s happening here?”  
  
“What do you think?” Odette whispered, nipping underneath his ear.  
  
Nesha reached down and started stroking him underneath his pants, also kissing his neck. There was _no way_. “Is…is this a threesome? Those aren’t real, they only happen in porn!”  
  
They both giggled and Nesha teased, “Porn had to get the idea _somewhere_ from reality, Shin-san.”  
  
Well, damn. “Well, I…I have to…to make you both come equally in that case, right?”  
  
Odette looked…surprised, “Well, I mean, I appreciate the idea, but--”  
  
Both women gasped as he managed to pick them both up, grunting, going toward the only bedroom. The bed wasn’t very big, about a full, but he supposed he could manage. Setting them down, he dragged out, “Get…get naked, I have work to do.”  
  
“You’re kind of crazy, Yagami” Nesha snickered.

“Hey, he said he has work to do, _Nesha_ ” Odette replied, seeming almost coy before reaching out to remove the blond woman’s tank top.  
  
Shin observed completely as they undressed each other down to their very lacy thongs, playfully grabbing each other’s breasts. It was the drugs. The drugs had him hallucinating. Nesha pouted as he pinched her nipple, sliding the barbell back and forth for a moment. “Hey, pal, I thought you said you had work to do.”  
  
“Just curious…kiss her.”  
  
“Kiss her?”  
  
“Yea, kiss Odette. Grab her tits too.”  
  
Nesha sulked and hugged Odette, “You some kind of prick dom?”  
  
“Mmm, we haven’t gotten to the pricking yet…I need to make sure you’re nice and wet first.”  
  
Odette raised a brow when he made her lie on her side and Nesha on her back right beside her. Shin directed again, “Kiss and grab her tits…”  
  
They complied somewhat begrudgingly while he deliberated where to start. Trailing his hands up the curves of their body, he nodded slowly. First things first: were their bodies as weirdly sensitive as his was right now? It felt like his skin was on fire.  
  
“Mm…” Odette murmured as he stroked his thumb over her panties along with Nesha’s.  
  
Shin nodded slowly, continuing to test the waters for a few minutes to get them warmed up. Okay…Odette was hot. Like, really hot. But…there was this crazy lust he had right now for Nesha. He really wouldn’t have minded this almost fever dream with _just_ her but even if this did turn out he was having some crazy fantasy on the couch and he was out of his mind, he wasn’t going to be rude…  
  
Odette swayed her hips a bit as he reached to take the impeding garment away before moving to Nesha. She looked bored. Soon. Touching Odette, he drawled, “I have to get her into it too, right…?”  
  
“Yea, Nesha’s a hard case” Odette teased, pinching Nesha’s nipple.

“Hmm, let me work on that…you have any lube?”  
  
Nesha made a face as Odette grabbed a bottle of oil off the nightstand, handing it to him. He dripped it over their inner thighs, reaching again and thumbing the groove of their inner legs. Odette moaned as he spread her lower lips with his pointer and middle finger, using the latter to run slow circles around her clit. He glanced to Nesha to watch her swallow slow as he did the same to her. Yea…he’d start on her then.  
  
He dragged Odette closer to Nesha, continuing his administrations with one hand before dragging his middle three fingers down the length of Nesha’s sex. Time to work.  
  
“W-Wait” she rasped as he leaned over, kissing near first base.  
  
“Why…? You don’t like it…?”  
  
“I didn’t say _that_ , just--”  
  
Okay. Bending back the ‘hood’, he curled his tongue around her clit, swirling around the pink nub nice and slow. He felt her tremble, a long exhale escaping her lips. Taking a few more laps, he pulled away and purred. “Spread your legs.”  
  
“E-Eh…?”  
  
“Spread your legs” he directed again, pushing two fingers inside of Odette.  
  
Nesha slowly opened her legs, holding underneath her thighs. Going back in, he suckled her clit and the folds of flesh around it, drawing them into his mouth and flicking his tongue. “A-Ah, fuck…”  
  
That little hip bump against his mouth got him going when he moved to lick the inner creases, rubbing her hard core with his thumb. She was a tough one, he wasn’t getting many vocal cues here…  
  
“Mm, mm--” she choked.  
  
He’d pushed his fingers deep into her sex, finding the little sensitive, spongy spot as he returned to sucking the pulsing nub. Readjusting his hand, he slowly, perhaps at least a little inadvertently thinking to torture tease, stroked Odette’s clit with his thumb and used his fingers to also search out her g-spot.  
  
“Fuck! Fuck!” Odette sobbed, thrusting against his hand.  
  
“Stop, stop, I’m goin--” Nesha rasped.  
  
Shin sat up, licking his lips as Nesha convulsed, her thighs clenching as her cum ran down her swollen sex. He pouted, spreading Odette’s legs next, wondering how he could make this fairer…  
  
Odette’s body was shaking, her hands running through his hair as he licked her already wet pussy. “A-Ah, ah, shit--!”   
  
“No, no” Nesha whined as he returned to finger her. She was also soaking wet, grinding her heels into the bed as her lower body bucked off the bed.  
  
Feeling triumphant when Odette came next, Shin sat up and squeezed their nipples as they heaved, pitchy. Nesha giggled, raspy, “I-I guess lingual skills run in the family.”  
  
“Literally…bleach.”  
  
Odette laughed, sitting up on her haunches and grasping his arms, pulling him to lie at the head of the bed. He blinked drearily as Nesha dragged his jeans down his hips, Odette grasping the hem of his boxers. Oh? Nesha poured the drippy oil down his cock, her hand wrapping around his shaft and jerking the loose skin up and down while swirling her fingers around the head.  
  
Shin gnawed the corner of his lip while Odette stretched out to suck at the base, her soft lips curling around one ball. Fuck. Nesha kissed him _hard,_ almost snatching the life out of him, before pulling away, purring as she continued to stroke him. “Boys don’t usually make me come pussy eating, Shin-chan, they normally get bored.”  
  
She was so fucking hot. “Don’t worry, it won’t be the last time today if I have any say…”

The blonde gasped when he tugged her leg to bring her lower body to where his face was reclined. Odette dragged his sack between her lips before releasing, grabbing the back of Nesha’s head, “Suck his dick, Nesha.”  
  
“Fine, I guess he did make me come…”  
  
Fuck. Shin’s eyes closed, Odette going back to work on his balls, groaning as Nesha sank her mouth down over half his length, feeling her head bob up and down his cock while her tongue ran down his length. Fuck, it felt _crazy_ , his body was sensitive as hell. Managing to open his eyes, he stared at her rosy pussy. Oh…now he had some time for some technical points.  
  
He managed to reach the bottle of oil, pouring some in his hands before spreading her pussy open. Looking at the internal fold of skin, he ran his pointer finger on the other hand up and down the surface slowly before pinching the edge lightly between his fingers, rubbing it. Shin smiled as she moaned over his cock, her legs shaking a bit. Using his fingertips, he used the lightest graze to run over her opening, doing torturously languid circles. Nesha was whining but wiggled her ass. “You like that?”  
  
“Mm.”  
  
Pinching back her hood, her legs buckled when he teasingly brushed his nails over her exposed clit. Chuckling huskily, he fingered her, hearing that enticing little squelch. Using the oil on her skin, he used his free hand to push a digit into her ass. Her head lifted on _that_. “W-What the— _fuck_ , _fuck, fuck_.”  
  
He left his fingers inside of her to feel the contractions of the orgasm, sobbing. “Mmm, that’s two for you, right…?”  
  
Nesha’s chest was heaving as he turned her on her back, easing himself from Odette’s lips. “Come here, Odette. It’s your turn.”  
  
Odette eagerly came to him as he sat up on his knees. Ah yes, there was that latent dominant asshole personality of his that apparently came out high too. He grasped the back of her head, pulling her into a hard kiss, running his tongue against hers. Pulling away, he kissed down her throat and whispered, “Bend over.”  
  
She dropped her lower body, swaying her raised bottom. Shin rubbed her sex before slipping his cock inside of her. Odette inhaled hard and Shin grabbed her hips. “Am I…Am I hurting you…?”  
  
“No. _Fuck no_. Fuck me.”  
  
Obliging, he rushed, pushing in and out, in and out, rolling his hips. Odette’s voice was escalating as she moaned with each grind, each thrust. “Fuck. Fuck! Harder, please.”  
  
Shin bit his lower lip, listening to the wet slip as he jerked in and out faster and deeper. Looking to Nesha, he found her gnawing her lip, watching them. Pausing, he leaned over and grabbed Nesha’s ankle so she was aligned… “Odette, eat her pussy while I pound you.”  
  
“F-Fuck, sh-should I call you ‘master’, too?” Odette joked.  
  
“I kind of liked Shin-chan?”  
  
She laughed, burying her face in Nesha’s crotch while he continued. At this angle, he was looking right at Nesha who was still staring back at him impatiently. Oh yea, he…he was excited too.  
  
Odette screamed in ecstasy as her sex contracted, wrapping around his hard shaft. Shin honestly wasn’t sure how he hadn’t come yet himself, this was insane. She was writhing as he pulled out, probably because whatever this pill was had everything on some hyper enhancement. Shin smiled, dazed, as he stroked her back. “…Might end up owing you an orgasm.”  
  
“Mmkayyy…”  
  
Nesha also smiled as he got closer. “You have some kind of monster stamina, ‘Shin-chan’? I don’t know many guys who wouldn’t have shot a cumload yet.”  
  
“Like I said…I have work to do.”  
  


Just stupid excited, he lifted her off the bed, earning him a gasp. She yelped when he pushed inside of her. Nesha was breathing hard as he rolled and paced, wrapping her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist. “S-Shit,” she rasped, “I—I want it harder too. Harder.”  
  
He complied, grasping her ass in his hands, groaning as he slid in and out of her wet cavern. It…was pretty much as good as he imagined, fuck. Kissing her neck, her whimpers turned into cries of pleasure as he kept his pace. The weariness that periled him his first night with Naomi was not present here, either the drugs making him Superman or too stupid to realize he was exhausted.

“Stop, stop, stop” Nesha rasped, gripping his shoulders tight.  
  
Shin nibbled on his lip as she climaxed, shivering as she took large breaths. Pulling out, he lied her on her back. She closed her eyes, a thin sheen of sweat and whatever else on her skin as he got close to her ear. Pushing back a limp lock of hair, he whispered, “…So did this rich kid know how to use their cock or not?”  
  
Nesha smiled impishly, her eyes still shut, “Cheeky fucker. You want a medal?”  
  
Grinning lazily, he turned over on his back, grasping Odette who looked confused, “Wha…?”  
  
“I owe you an orgasm, remember?”  
  
Pulling her to sit on top of him, he felt her out, fingering before guiding his shaft inside of her. Odette was instantly stammering, “F-F-Fuck.”  
  
He pumped his hips upward this time, grasping her waist with one hand. “Mmm, you don’t want to come again, Odette? I can stop…”  
  
“N-No, don’t” she moaned.  
  
“Good girl…come here, Nesha” he purred.  
  
Nesha sat up, seeming incredulous, as he beckoned her to sit on his face. Well, he wasn’t going to make her climax again, he was just going to do some post-orgasm teasing…  
  
Or, so he thought, as her riding his face got her to a _fourth_ orgasm meaning he had to get Odette _to_ four and he was running out of moves here! Well, there was _one_ but… “I do _not_ do anal” she leered when he suggested it.  
  
Nesha was lying limply on the bed, her eyes closed. She snickered sleepily, “You’re a little too…endowed for that region, big boy.”  
  
“…I tried it with someone a few times.”  
  
Odette was cross and adamant for a few minutes but slowly looked…perplexed. “J-Just the tip and if it hurts too bad, no.”

  
“Absolutely…”  
  
Finding the rather well implemented oil, he made sure to get her ass lubricated which thankfully got her closer to peaking. Stroking his cock with the oil as well, he pushed the tip in as she requested…   
  
“Oh fuck” she breathed.  
  
Holding his shaft to get better guidance to not go any deeper than what she’d mandated, he raised a brow when she looked disturbed. “…J-Just a little more.”  
  
Going a quarter more, she nodded, “T-That’s it, perfect.”  
  
It was a little hard to control but he managed to get her off without just…pummeling her. They were both lying on their backs, satisfied, when Nesha suddenly leered. “…Hey, what the fuck do we look like with the _man_ not coming? What’s wrong with you?”  
  
“Yea, our pussies not good enough for you?” Odette huffed.  
  
“Of course not…” Shin assured, his eyes half closed, “…I might have a little kink I want fulfilled since we basically just did live-action porn.”  
  
Odette giggled, opening her mouth and tugging his length vigorously toward it. Man, she was awesome too, she just knew. “Nn…” he groaned as his seed shot out against her lips and tongue.  
  
Nesha, on the other hand, glowered, “I don’t let guys come on my face, sorry.”  
  
“Funny, you came on his face” Odette teased.  
  
“…Right. Fine, this once, but don’t tell anyone.”  
  
Sincerely a little _too_ pleased about that concession, Shin watched, bewitched, as she stroked him and his cum hit her tongue. Fuck yea…  
  
Nesha squeaked as he wrapped his tongue around her tit, letting the appendage juggle the piercing back and forth. They both were shocked when he got hard again too…

  
Huh…insta-bone.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
Where in the hell was he?  
  
Yagami Shin stared at… _some_ ceiling. It was kind of pulsing which meant either someone was about to crash through or he got clubbed over the head. Trying to readjust his eyes, he realized that…he couldn’t. What the hell? Was…was this what poor vision was like? This was shit. And why were his arms so heavy, was he tied up?  
  
Managing to move his head with his out of focus vision to look to the source, he paused to find Nesha lying there, sleeping heavily. She…was quite naked, her creamy body very apparent even in the dark. But why…was she naked…? And…why was _he_ naked? How did they come to be naked _together_? What was on his other arm?  
  
Slowly turning his head, his mind was not able to compute why Odette was also naked while he and Nesha were naked and almost in a comatose like sleep on his shoulder. Once again, he…woke up with no comprehension and feeling…sticky. But there were two women here, what sense…  
  
… Shin stared at Odette before looking back to Nesha…and back to Odette again. Turning to stare at Nesha again, he…  
  
“…Oh my God.”  
  
What the living _fuck_ happened?! He thought he was _hallucinating_!! Carefully sliding his arms from underneath their heads, he sat up…and almost crashed back into bed. It felt like he weighed a thousand pounds. “H-Holy crap…”  
  
What _time_ was it? What _day_ was it?! Gripping his skull, he tried to search a memory bank that seemed full of holes and was also on fire. He…he was coming here…to get…weed? What? He didn’t smoke weed, why did he come here for weed?!  
  
Finding his phone in his pants’ pocket, he breathed out, relieved to find it…was what he _assumed_ was the same day he thought it was but it was like 7 o’clock. Okay, time…time to make an escape here because he had no _human grasp_ on how this occurred.  
  
Going into the bathroom and taking a quick rinse, he’d…tried to wash off…parts but he just _grazed_ his nipple and got excited? What the hell was wrong with him?! Finding himself beating off, he recalled…holy _crap,_ they had taken drugs!!  
  
Staggering out of the bathroom, he pulled on his clothes and gazed around for a piece of paper. Okay, if…if this went _left_ , he could at least leave his contact info. This…was _not_ anything he thought would ever take place in his life.   
  
Shin set the paper on Nesha’s nightstand before covering the two in a blanket he found in the closet. Huh…two more women he had to apologize to because he had _absolutely no idea what he’d done to them_.  
  
Honestly a little scared, he managed to get out of the building…and it was weird getting home. He kept getting sidetracked by seeing the old record store where he and the twins used to go, the old ice cream shop where he got milkshakes…his heart felt like it was getting tight and he found himself almost crying. Why? It paced away though and he continued toward his childhood home feeling…airy. He just sincerely felt…blissful? Despite having lost four solid hours of his life apparently having kinky sex with not one but two strangers, he was just feeling kind of good. Nirvana.  
  
It was about eight by the time he was walking up the long driveway to the Yagami Mansion. He wasn’t sure what kind of witchcraft he consumed but he was still almost walking sideways and feeling just as loose and limber as a cloud. Shin smiled some when he saw his dad getting out of the car, holding his cell as if he’d just gotten off a call. He loved his dad…  
  
Oh Jesus, his dad. “Hey, son. You’re just getting back?” Yamada questioned, closing the door to his SUV.  
  
“Ha…ha, yea…” Be cool, dummy.

“Your mom said she’ll be home in about an hour and I know a good place for us to get something to eat when she gets here” Yamada nodded, taking out a bag from the backseat.  
  
Shin nodded rapidly, “That-That sounds wonderful.”  
  
Yamada raised a brow at him because Shin was outside of himself but he knew everything, even his mannerisms, were off as hell. “…You okay, Shin?”  
  
“U-Um fine.”  
  
His dad stared at him as they approached the front door, the man unlocking it and immediately turning on the lights in the entry. Shin stumbled in behind him before straightening up, smiling widely when his dad turned to look at him again. Be _cool_ , DUMMY.   
  
Alas, one Yagami Yamada gave him one look over before grabbing his jaw and staring him straight in the eye. “…Son, your pupils are so dilated your iris is almost black. What were you doing?”  
  
Damn it! “I-I really didn’t mean to, papa, I-I was visiting s-someone in Wasaba and-and I thought they had a bowl of mints on the table and-and it…it sure wasn’t mints.”  
  
Even impaired, that story sounded like bull. However, Yamada groaned, releasing him and shaking his head, “…Some things never change.”  
  
Eh? Yamada sighed, “When did you take this not mint?”  
  
“A-Around 3:30, 3:45…”  
  
“And you’re still feeling it?” Yamada questioned, startled.  
  
…Wow, that was weird, that was almost five hours ago. Yamada made a face and shook his head, walking toward the kitchen and getting something out of the drawer. It was yet another pill. Grabbing a bottle of water, he handed it to Shin and droned, “Take that and go sleep it off on the couch.”  
  
“O-Okay. What’s…what’s this?”  
  
“It’s something we have in testing phase but it’s either going to work for you or it won’t.”  
  
What now? Shin just nodded dumbly and took it, setting the water down. “So-Sorry, dad. I would never want to disappoint you doing something this-this dumb.”  
  
Yamada patted his back, “I know, son, you’re fine. Just don’t accept mints in Wasaba.”  
  
Yea, no kidding. They both went into the living room and Shin lied down on one of the elongated pieces while is dad stretched across the other, turning on the television. Grabbing the throw and going to sleep, Shin couldn’t help remember that… _whatever_ that sleep was on that drug, he didn’t have one thought about severed limbs or eyes hanging from walls. The cost was him having a kinky threesome with two strangers. Albeit very, very attractive strangers, but still strangers.  
  
…Huh. He guessed he was following his ‘nee-san’s’ orders, he thought sarcastically as he drifted off.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _“Yagami-san…you can have whoever you want.”  
  
He must’ve still been high as hell._

 _  
He was in a room with most of the women he’d had a sexual relationship with, around seven, and…Komari. She was the one that said that and it creeped him out. Unfortunately, he knew what Komari looked like naked and he knew what she sounded like flirty so his imagination had all the material it needed. He held up his hands. “Komari, that’s--”  
  
“You know you’re curious.”  
  
… “I…”  
  
Nesha and Odette were curled up on the bed with each other, his other high school partners staring at him drearily, also naked. Naomi was smirking at Komari. “Fuck her up.”  
  
“What in the HELL. No.”  
  
FINE, was he VAGUELY curious? Yes. Was he also not eager to be in that situation with Komari because he honestly valued her friendship and camaraderie more than a quick romp? ABSOLUTELY YES.   
  
“Shin?”  
  
He froze. What?  
  
Slowly looking over his shoulder, his throat went dry to find Lyla just on a separate bed entirely, staring at him, doe eyed. “…I love you.”  
  
“Shut up.”  
  
“Please…look deeper.”  
  
“Shut up! I fucking can’t STAND you!” he screamed.  
  
Her eyes closed and he was shivering with rage. Why was she here? Why…why couldn’t he get her out of his head? This--  
  
“…Fucking hafu.”  
  
Shin glared, glancing to his left. Standing there was not only Lyla’s bastard father but Sato, a rather racist duo if anything. Shin opened his mouth to say something to them, to tell them…something. Alas, Bajiru snorted, “…Fucking hafu with your broken ass brain. Like you could have ever been worthy of her.”  
  
“Shut the hell up, I was!!”  
  
Turning to her, about to demand why she wouldn’t just SAY something, the air was snatched and dragged out of his lungs instead.  
  
He covered his mouth, trying not to scream when Lyla and the other women were replaced by the limbs and eyes from Sharance. Sato chuckled, “Fucking hafu.”  
  
_Shin inhaled hard, sitting up stiffly. Fuck.   
  
“Sweetie Plum, are you okay?”  
  
Startled, he looked to the side and saw his mom standing there, wearing a sleek high waisted pair of dark pants and a white scoop neck shirt, her hair up. He almost didn’t recognize her, she rarely wore…pants. Holding his chest, he smiled, strained, “I’m-I’m okay, mama.”  
  
She came over and hugged his head to her stomach, stroking his hair, “…It’s all right, baby.”  
  
“I…I know, mom…” he rasped, “…I just don’t…don’t know how to forget.”  
  
“…I don’t know that you can, sweetie. Not normally anyway.”  
  
…Right. She kissed the top of his head, murmuring, “You were sleeping so soundly I didn’t want to wake you. C’mon, your papa wanted to take us to dinner.”  
  
He was…not slightly hungry after that dream but he just nodded. “Okay.”  
  
Shin yelped, once again alarmed, when his mom gave his ear closest to her one firm pinch and dragged it. _Damn, that hurt_. He had only ever _watched_ the other sons get it, why?! Dana smirked, letting go, “And _keep it in your pants,_ young man.”  
  
EH?? Shin gaped as she walked away, bringing to his attention his dad standing in the large entry way, leaning against the doorway with a smirk on his face. How-how did she know--?? “…I could help you with the other thing, son, but you’re literally covered in hickeys. You have one on your jaw.”  
  


 _WHAT?_ Clambering to his feet, he stared into one of the mirrors on the wall and almost _died._ Well, while he was _high out of his mind_ , he failed to notice his neck looked like a constellation of _disaster_. Blushing deeply, he was… _mortified_. Panicked, he blurted, “I-It’s not what it looks like!”  
  
“Son, we know you’re a healthy young man” Yamada yawned, stretching, “Just be safe. C’mon, let’s get something to eat.”  
  
Ugh. Bashfully sticking his hands in his pockets, he wandered to the foyer where Shaun, Jill, and his mother were putting on jackets. Maybe…he had a turtleneck? About to resign from this dinner out of _shame_ , Yamada rounded the corner and cheerfully hustled them out. Great.

Shin wanted to sit in the trunk, honestly, when they got in the SUV but the kids commanded the back because he guessed that was cool. Riding solo in the middle, he drearily gazed to the passenger seat where Dana hummed. God, his mom thought he was a slut. And based on the last 48 hours, _he was_.

“Sweetie Plum, how was Koji doing? Is he goofing off?” Dana asked.  
  
What miracle let him keep ‘Sweetie Plum’ status? “Oh, uh, not really, actually? He was like he was at home during school, he had a segment for goofing off and a segment for school and he maintained both equally. The other one though…might be some concern there.”  
  
“Other one?” Yamada echoed.  
  
“Yea, Nerimaru was there a little too often…”  
  
Their parents exchanged a quick look as Yamada stopped at a stop light. “…In Saitama? He’s traveling all the way there?”  
  
“Yea, but I wouldn’t say anything. Koji said once Nelly got a dose of reality, he would stop. I think it’s true, Nelly just needs to get used to _not_ having Koji around all the time.”  
  
“Poor baby” Dana pouted, “I really wish Koji had decided to go to school with him.”  
  
Yamada shook his head, taking a turn, “Koji’s just not that kid, Dana, he’s not clingy. Nerimaru was clingy from the start. He does need a little separation.”  
  
Mama sulked because she wanted all her babies to be happy, Shin thought with a smile. He guessed she could have made a bigger fuss about him coming home covered in hickeys. Shin scowled when Shaun suddenly popped over his shoulder. The youngest whispered, “…Dalmatian neck.”  
  
“I’ll show you Dalmatian neck--”  
  
Shaun laughed as Shin put him in a neck lock, Jill snickering. Dang kids. Wait a minute. Glowering back over his shoulder, still holding Shaun, he realized… “Where’s Tony?”  
  
“Oh, Tony is far too popular to eat dinner with us” Yamada said dryly.  
  
“Hey, get your twin” Shin grunted at Jill.  
  
Their only sister shrugged, “He’s turned into a jerk lately. It’s like he got that bad side of Koji’s but it doesn’t go away at all.”  
  
Huh. Shin released Shaun, advising him to put his seatbelt on, and drawled, “Oh, I guess I’ll be home more to observe that ‘bad side’ then.”  
  
“You sure?” Dana smirked over her shoulder, “You’re not going back to your brother’s for a week and coming back with a hickey chain?”  
  
“Mama!”  
  
They laughed, much to his _intense embarrassment._ Wasn’t this a little disappointing? He was _generally_ the good one and over the last week he’d taken a chapter out of Koji and Nelly’s playbook! He had to have lost _some_ Sweetie Plum status!  
  
When they pulled up to apparently a Thai restaurant and were seated, however, the younger kids were talking to their parents normally and his parents were talking to him normally...he awkwardly eased himself back in to talking to them normally…  
  
…They were fine? Like, that’s it? Other parents would _flip_. Of…of course, his mother just saw it looked like he had been attacked by a vacuum cleaner, not that he’d had stranger sex with one of the twin’s friends with benefits and then an even more stranger danger threesome after taking drugs accidentally. But…  
  
Shin swallowed as he ate his jasmine rice, feeling…ill. Hafu. They were…a normal non-judgmental family…and there were a segment of people like Okamoto Bajiru and Sergeant Sato who looked at them and thought they were vile. These…these were good people.  
  
Angry again, Shin swore he’d fight all of that in the future head on. They…they had no right. None. His parents had been through _so much_ and they had every single right and purpose to be bitter and tired. Instead, they took their kids out for dinner because they wanted to spend time with them after a murder shift on both of their parts. They _laughed_ , they _talked—_ this was normal. Or at the very least it was _good_.

Like a phantom, alas, an image of the decaying fingertips of maybe an adult, maybe a child, suddenly gripped his memory and shredded it to pieces. Trembling, forcing his general wellbeing to pick up the good and put it back together, he smiled weakly.  
  
…They…might not have been right about the ‘hafu’ shit.   
  
…They sure might’ve been right about his broken brain though.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
“…You had _what_?”  
  
Yagami Shin groaned as he slammed down on the sofa, alone on a Wednesday night. Mom had to stay late and work on a wedding dress, his dad was on night duty, and Jill was working on a project with one of her friends. Shaun was _also_ working on a project but advised he only wanted Shin’s help ‘once I get the parts together’. Oh lord. And the other one, Tony? God only knows, he was borrowing the whole Narrative of Koji and Nelly at this point and adding chapters because the kid was gone _all night_. On a _weekday_ though?  
  
He’d honestly called Koji to say the whole system was falling apart with no one here but the jerk instantly started heckling that he heard about the ‘hickey debacle’ from Jill. God. So…he just confessed to Koji what occurred.  
  
“I had a threesome…while high on drugs.”  
  
“Dude.”  
  
“I know, Koji” Shin grunted, turning on the television, “ _Highly_ out of character for me, I promise.”  
  
Koji echoed, “ ‘Highly out of character’? That’s not even in your realm of existence, _saint_ , what the fuck?”  
  
Shin rolled his eyes, flipping through the channels, “I _am_ human, Koji. Anyway, that’s not why I called you.”  
  
“I beg the fuck your pardon? You’ll call me, tell me you got fucked up on _drugs_ , and banged two women at the same time and that’s _‘not why you called me’_?”  
  
Smirking, Shin shrugged, “You’re coming Friday right? We’ll discuss it then. For _now_ , what the hell is going on with Tony?”  
  
“What’s the little prick doing now?”  
  
“He has been gone…almost all week. The only reason we know he’s alive is he comes home in the morning, _exhausted,_ takes a shower, and goes off to school. I don’t know if he’s doing homework, I don’t know if he’s sleeping—hell, I don’t know if he’s going to _school_ at this point. And having a passing conversation with him—he’s a little asshole! What happened??”  
  
It sounded like Koji was writing something. He probably wasn’t thinking anything about home, he was trying to get out of college in record time. “Well…”  
  
“What?”  
  
“We never quite equipped him with being the oldest in this situation. Y’know, at any one given time, we were there and making sure they were doing homework, getting their rest, getting fed—really, can you say that you’re not seeing some of that in Jill and Shaun too?”  
  
Shin paused. Slowly looking up, it…dawned on him.   
  
Koji was _right_! Jill was rarely home either, Shaun was off doing… _something_ , gathering _parts,_ whatever that meant! Not one of them had made dinner and he hadn’t seen not one of them sit down and do homework! Jill might not have even been at a friend’s house working on a project! “Ugh, Koji.”  
  
“I know, man. The other half might be in trouble.”  
  
“Well, I’ll…put my foot down then.”  
  
Snorting loudly, Koji said dryly, “You really think you can run in there now and commandeer this situation? And then commandeer it for now like _two-ish months_ and expect it to stay working?”  
  
… “Damn it.”  
  
“Nell’s coming Friday too, we can discuss some reconnaissance efforts but, fact of the matter is, Shin, they’re growing up. They…have to make mistakes.”  
  
Shin grimaced at that, rubbing his brow, “Yes, I…I know.”  
  
“Easier said than done though, especially for Jill. We can talk about it later.”  
  
“Yea…” Shin murmured, “Sorry, you’re trying to study. Just was bugging me.”  
  
The cantankerous fellow scoffed, “Concerns about the family are valid, Shin. I would want to be involved in rectifying where I can. Don’t worry regardless though, we want you chilling.”  
  
“Yea, yea…I’ll see you in a few days.”  
  
Clicking off, Shin absently stared at Inuyasha and wondered about his life. It was like seven o’clock and he was stretched out on the couch like an old man. Not that he _minded_ but…  
  
He jumped when his cell phone rang. Eh? Taking it out of his pocket, he was confused by the number. Who was this? Pressing the green phone button, he pressed it to his ear. “…Hello?”  
  
“Oh! Hi. Shin, right?”  
  
…Nesha? His heart started to race, sitting up quickly. What the hell? “A-Ah, yes, th-this is he. Ne-Nesha, right?”  
  
“Nn. Are you busy right now?”  
  
“N-Not at all.” What…what was going on? Did something happen?  
  
“If I give you an address, you think you can come by tonight?”  
  
…What? “Uh, I…I think it can be arranged. I can head out here shortly.”  
  
“Ah! Great! The address is…”  
  
…What? Shin hung up and stared at the screen as the credits started to roll. Huh. Guess…he should go figure out what’s going on. Standing and grabbing his coat, he wrote a note to his parents that he might be back late and he’d try to call before he came home. But…late? What? If she was confronting him with what happened, it…should be pretty quick. Unless…she was having him beat up for what he did. Oh man.  
  
Getting into his car which he’d spent the day tuning up, he drove into West Wasaba. Truth be told, he…had never really come here since he was a small child. In the rungs of worst sections, it was one up from the bottom. It…was where his dad was born and raised but it…  
  
Okay, it might have been a bit prejudiced but he drove _out_ of West Wasaba and parked in North Wasaba to _walk_ into West Wasaba. Was it dangerous walking? Absolutely. But if someone stole his car, he couldn’t account for that. He…definitely could account for beating someone up though.  
  
Alas, the walk was innocent enough. Sure, he saw some hookers and pimps and a couple drug dealers but it wasn’t like someone was just shooting at random. He actually got stopped by an older woman sweeping outside of a diner and asked if he was Yagami Yamada’s son and to tell him ‘hello’. His dad was a celebrity here, it was kind of surreal.   
  
Going into an old apartment building, he looked at the slip of paper where he wrote the address Nesha gave him down. 2-8. Second floor, apartment eight…  
  
Wandering to the bare wooden door after taking the worn stairs, he took a deep breath. Here goes. He knocked and stuffed his hands into his pockets as he awaited an answer. It was just so crazy to think that yesterday he…he was having sex with this stranger? Like, this was going to be the most awkward thing _ever_ , what even got into him to have gotten as far as he had yesterday?

  
The door opened and Nesha appeared, wearing a pair of torn red short shorts exposing her thick thighs and a black Henley tank top that sat low on her chest. Shin stared at her face. Oh.  
  
“Hi! Come in. I hope it wasn’t hard to find.”  
  
How many what now? He mindlessly followed her in, kicking his shoes off at the door, “U-Um, not…not at all. My…my dad lived around here somewhere, I think. Where are we…?”  
  
“This is my sister’s apartment. She’s working the night shift so I asked her if I could use it.”  
  
…Why? She had her own place. Shin raised a brow when she grabbed his hand…and pulled it around her. Wait??  
  
“…U-Uh--”  
  
She hugged his neck, staring up at him with half-closed green eyes. “I know it sounds dumb as hell but I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you since yesterday.”  
  
Meep. “U-U-Uh.”  
  
“I woke up before Odette did last night and saw your number. I hid it” she purred, kissing his jaw, “I knew next time I didn’t want to share.”  
  
…Next time?? Shin almost gawked as she kissed to his neck, nipping. What the hell was happening here?! “U-Um, Nesha-san, I-I am so, so flattered, but--”  
  
“Hmm? But-t-t-t?” she sang, pulling away to take off his jacket.

  
Shin was alarmed when she pulled him to the couch, pushing him there to crawl and sit on his crotch. What was even _happening right now_?! About to say something, his brain liquefied when she took off her shirt. _The nipple piercings.  
  
_ “N-Nesha” he blurted before he teetered over the edge, “I-I mean, you are a—a _gorgeous_ …sexy…”  
  
“Go on” she teased as he trailed off, kissing the corner of his lips.  
  
Yea, Shin, what were you trying to say? “I-I don’t—I don’t know much about you!”  
  
“What’s to know?”  
  
Shin swallowed as her tongue flicked at his throat, “L-Like! Like, how-how old you are?! Are you-Are you even-even old enough?”  
  
She smirked, stroking his chest over his shirt, “We’re almost the same age. My birthday is December 8th, 1981.”  
  
…Oh. “W-Well, okay, that’s—that’s not sketchy but-but you are my dad’s friend’s daughter!”  
  
Nesha grabbed the ends of his shirt while he fought this losing battle with apparently whatever was about to happen here. He rasped as she kissed him, so sultry with the way she dipped her tongue into his mouth and withdrew so playfully, returning while he was still recovering from the last play. Fuck. Between kisses, she purred, “Well…my bastard dad…knocked up my mom…on a drunken binge…he got married…and found out about me later…and refused to acknowledge me…”  
  
… _What_? “That’s—that’s terrible” he rasped, closing his eyes.  
  
“Mmhmm…he just paid my mom…under the table…child support…to keep us secret…so you’ll excuse me…if I don’t care if I’m fucking his good friend’s son…”  
  
…Damn. Kissing back, he murmured, “Are…are we fucking?”  
  
“Are we?” she whispered.  
  
 _Damn,_ she was so _hot_. She giggled when he reversed so he was now on top of her, frantically reaching for her pants. It was like getting doused with cold water and _good sense_ when there was a hard knock at the door. Sitting up stiffly, he stared as Nesha sat up as well, clearly annoyed. “Ooh, that bitch.”  
  
“W-What?”  
  
Marching over, Nesha didn’t…bother to put a shirt on as she tore the door open. He gawked to find Odette on the other side, looking _pissed_. “I _knew it,_ you damn _skank_!”  
  
“I don’t _want to share_!!” Nesha hissed.

“Oh, so you won’t even let me contact him at all, huh?!”  
  
“Andrew gets out tomorrow, just wait to fuck him!!”  
  
…Maybe if he just… casually climbed out of the window. Actually going to weigh this option and the amount of height off the ground as they argued over him, of all people, he yelped when Nesha snapped. “Fine! This one last time!”  
  
What now?! Shin looked up from pulling up the window, confused, as Odette scoffed, walking in, “That’s all I need _anyway_.”  
  
Wait a damn minute here. Shin threw his hands up, shaking his head, “L-Look, that-that threesome whoredom was while I was out of my mind on that pill. I-I have no confidence in my abilities sober and sane.”  
  
“It’s okay” Odette purred, hugging him from behind.  
  
“Yea, as long as you stay hard, we’ll take care of the rest” Nesha assured, pressing her naked chest to his.  
  
No! Like, this was _insane_? Two threesomes two days in a row?! Who did this?! Just ‘stay hard’?! He wasn’t their stud! Nesha got down on her knees, alas, and his mind went to goo again…maybe…

…And here he was worried about the kids. He was just as reckless and careless on his own too! Just…

…Maybe it…wasn’t that bad an idea though?  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
“Dude… _what_?”  
  
Shin groaned loudly, standing under the deck with now not only Koji but Nelly. Nelly got suspicious and came to investigate when Shin moseyed out casually with Koji on an announced smoke break, probably thinking it was weird Shin went with him. Now he _really_ had to quit, he could not have them thinking he was their smoking buddy as all three of them stood around smoking.  
  
Koji heckled him to finally tell the story. Nelly asked ‘what story?’. The story of his _threesome._ Great.   
  
Nelly stared at him, bewildered, “…You? _You_ had multisex?”  
  
“On drugs” Koji added.  
  
“… _On drugs??”  
  
_ Glaring at Koji, Shin stuck the cigarette in his mouth, annoyed. “…I ran into Joe, right? Joe…told me he left some weed in the apartment he gave me under the floorboards. He said the girl he ran into that I gave the apartment to had him all dumb in the brain and asked if I could go retrieve it. I go…and the girl had me dumb in the brain too. The end.”  
  
“Oh, shut the hell up” Koji snorted, “’The end’, my ass. What happened?”  
  
Shin rolled his eyes, sighing gravely, “…She invited me in apparently because she also thought I was attractive. I sat on the couch and felt stupid because I didn’t know her. I was talking about some craziness with her roommate when she offered me a drink. She said she didn’t know me and I was like, yea, that’s true. She insisted I finish the drink because hospitality and I was like, okay. On the table though, there was a bowl that looked like those pastel mints, right? So, I asked if I could have a candy, she said ‘yes’, so I…took a candy.”  
  
“…Which was…?” Nelly hedged.  
  
“…Ecstasy?”  
  
“MD damn MA” whistled Koji, “Shit will _fuck. You. Up.”  
  
_ Shin leered, “You better _not_ be taking that shit, Koji.”  
  
“I’ve taken it a few times but I’m just not a pill popper” Koji shrugged.  
  
Nelly shook his head to the negative, “I took it once at a rave…lemme tell you, I don’t remember a portion of my life well for that night so I knew then and there it was not for me.”  
  
Groaning, Shin shook his head, “Well, I can also say it’s not for me. I swore I was hallucinating. They freaked out because I was like, I took someone’s medication, and I realized there was another thing of candy on the table so there was some confusion. I…started to get dazed and next thing I know, I was agreeing to a threesome. I woke up, like, three hours later, dazed and confused, staggered home, dad gave me something, I went to sleep, and…that’s it.”  
  
“Wow” Koji shook his head, “That’s wild.”  
  
With a smirk, Nelly gave Shin a knowing look, “One of the kids told me you’re still going out late at night there, nii-san. You make some kind of freaky connection?”  
  
Damn it. Koji raised a brow as Shin groaned, burying his face in his hands, “Now I didn’t hear about _this_. What’s going on?”  
  
“…After I got off the phone with you Wednesday, I got a call from Nesha, the…the very hot one that makes me all stupid in the head. I left my number in case, y’know, there was some confusion over what happened.”  
  
“Uh huh” Koji smirked.  
  
“ _Anyway_ , she called and asked if I was busy. I wasn’t so…I went over, expecting to be beat up. She…almost immediately starts coming on to me and…yea, I buckled like a wet piece of paper. And…Odette showed up.”  
  
The twins stared at him silently before Nelly cleared his throat. “…You had a second threesome…the next day.”  
  
Shin nodded wearily. Koji scratched his brow before saying: “…Wow.”  
  
“And…Thursday and Friday afternoon, I…may have gone over to Nesha’s place, as Odette has relocated to live with her boyfriend, and slept with her a few times since.”  
  
“How hot are we talking here?” Koji questioned, puzzled.  
  
“Yea, she’s got to be like, off the charts” Nelly droned.  
  
Shin exhaled with a ‘fwoo’, shaking his head in just…awe. “…I don’t even know how to describe her. She’s just…fucking gorgeous. She has the perfect amount of curves, this long thick blonde hair, thick thighs, pierced…locations.”  
  
“And currently you’re dick choice number one for this goddess?” Nelly glowered.  
  
“I am sure she has other partners” Shin rolled his eyes.  
  
As if answering this declaration, his phone suddenly rang. The twins smirked widely at him as he tried not to _fight them_. Sure enough though, it was Nesha… taking a deep breath and preparing to turn her down for the first time this week, he answered, “Hello?”  
  
“Oh, hey. I forgot to tell you last night, I’m having a big party at my sister’s place and you’re welcome to come if you’re available.”  
  
Shin raised a brow, a little surprised the call changed up. “O-Oh. Well, um, I-I would but my brothers have come home from college to visit so…”  
  
“You can bring them if they want to come. No big deal if you can’t.”  
  
That was one thing about Nesha, this was definitely a ‘do or don’t do, I don’t care’ situation. He…kind of appreciated it, he had to acknowledge to himself this was almost a hundred percent lust based. They had…fair conversations but nothing too deep. “Okay…well, I’ll talk it over with them and I guess we can just show up?”  
  
“Door’s open at a Wasaba party, man.”  
  
A Wasaba party…clicking off, he made a face. Nelly tapped his ashes off, drawling, “Booty call? Or…wait, is it a dick call when it’s the woman calling?”  
  
“I’d say so” Koji nodded.  
  
Shin leered at them, putting his cigarette out, “No. She invited me to a party. I am allowed to bring you two… if you want to go.”  
  
Scoffing, Nelly blew a smoke ring, “Who the _fuck_ do you think you’re talking to? Yea, we want to go, dumbass.”  
  
The miscreant’s twin just snickered and Shin sighed deeply. “Fine, fine. Let’s eat dinner first. Oh, and before we do _that_ , let’s discuss this younger trio situation.”  
  
“I gave Nelly the footnote edition” Koji drawled, “He thinks we just need to let it be.”  
  
Shin gawked as Nelly nodded. “Let it be? They’re going to _flunk out of high school_.”  
  
“And that shit is on them, Shin! We didn’t raise those punks like that, we didn’t raise them to be out all night AND not doing homework or going to school. We taught them balance and they’re out here diving off the scales head first into the ground” Nelly countered.  
  
Damn it though. “Jill _too_ though? We want _Jill_ failing?” he protested weakly.  
  
“We don’t want _any_ of them failing, bro” Koji insisted, dusting off his hands, “…We don’t have a hand on this one. We’re the older siblings. Yes, we played a lot of parent but, end of the day, they’re at the stage where listening to us might be major hit or miss.”  
  
Ugh. Nelly stroked his chin, “…So?”  
  
“So, as I was telling Shin, we didn’t exactly purpose Tony to take over the role of ‘oldest’. And, to be honest, our parents are just a little too passive sometimes. Maybe…time for them to step up to the plate?”  
  


Oh dang. Shin’s brows furrowed, drawling, “…Mom would _obliterate_ those kids.”  
  
Collectively, he, Koji, and Nelly were pretty contained. They did what they were supposed to…now, that did not mean when they weren’t doing what they were supposed to, their mother didn’t come in ready to smite them. Usually it had to get to the advanced step of a school official reaching out but that…really only had to happen _once_ for any of them. Save Koji who was just going to fight regardless. But that other stuff like missing homework or failing quizzes? Nope.  
  
“We can talk to them. They’re still our younger siblings, I still feel like we did raise them somewhat. Just if that older one gets mouth and I don’t want to knock it in, mama will have to get them right” Koji shrugged.  
  
“To be honest, I think it would _only_ be Tony that would give us lip. As weird as the kid is, I think we can reason with Shaun and Jill definitely will at least hear us out” Nelly nodded.  
  
True… “Whatcha doing?”  
  
Shin’s eyes widened, looking over his shoulder, finding Shaun standing there, looking at them suspiciously. “When’d you start smoking under the deck?”  
  
“This is our secret meeting spot, you little ninja” Koji snorted, “What are _you_ doing?”  
  
“Well, I was hoping I could tell nii-san about my project but if you’re busy.”  
  
Shin shook his head, “No, I’ve been dying to hear this one. First though, let’s have a chat.”  
  
“Can I smoke a cigarette too?”  
  
“You can get your ass beat too” Nelly offered.

Shaun pouted as Koji smirked at Nelly, “We are _not_ setting a good example in this domain, Shaun. We don’t want any of you younger kids following us on this one. Cigarettes are very bad for you, we just were really stupid to start smoking them and it’s not a good idea to.”  
  
Shin nodded emphatically. Shaun frowned, “…Well, they do smell funny. What do you want to talk about? Am I in trouble?”  
  
“No, no…just, how are your grades? Don’t lie either, we can find out” Shin replied.  
  
Counting on his fingers, Shaun mused, “I have three As, two Bs, and one D.”  
  
“Well, that’s impressive, you’re doing great” Koji nodded, “Is there anything we can do to help you with that D?”  
  
Shaun shook his head miserably, “It’s in art so I have to work on my skill.”  
  
A D in art… “Eh, maybe I need to speak to that teacher, sounds like they’re being tough on you” Shin groused.  
  
“I’m not good at the totally creative stuff we draw. I like the technical drawing but my teacher says I have to be good in both.”  
  
Nelly frowned, “Well, as long as you’re _trying_ that should be good enough. We want you to get admitted to Subami High School, no problems, and having a stupid D in art because you’re not Picasso is going to be an issue.”  
  
“I kind of want to go to North Wasaba High.”  
  
… “…Why for?” Koji questioned after a long moment of silence.  
  
Shaun shrugged again, “See how the other side lives.”  
  
“You know that sounds elitist as shit, right?” Koji smirked widely.  
  
The youngest looked surprised before crossing his arms, looking thoughtful, “…I thought it was a good idea to get a better perspective but I hadn’t thought about how it sounds like I’m going to observe some other species or something…”  
  
“Dad would never let you go anyway” Shin assured, “Don’t be put off of the idea, of course. I’m glad you want to get out of the Subami bubble and meet other people. You’ll get that in college and maybe even in high school since they have immersion and expansion programs.”  
  
“Yea, I don’t mean to say ‘stay with your own kind’ or any equally classist bullshit, just don’t go to a high school just so you can see less…affluent people” Koji amended.  
  
“I understand” Shaun nodded.  
  
What could they really say here though? If these grades were accurate, Shaun was maintaining all of the subjects he really could be focusing on here at home. Sure, he could draw all night and see if it got any better but art was subjective anyway. Maybe he would go speak to the teacher. Nelly rubbed his hands together, “You’re doing great, Shaun. Just try to keep this ‘out all night’ thing to a minimum and make sure to maintain your chores. You’re becoming an adult and these are important life skills you’ll be responsible for your own soon.”  
  
Sulking, Shaun mumbled, “You guys stayed out all night…”  
  
“Didn’t we maintain our grades, chores, and make you dinner almost every night?”  
  
“…Yes” Shaun conceded.  
  
“You’ve got the grades, just try to maintain the chores and feeding yourself _not_ junk” Koji nodded, “You’re doing fine. There’s others we’re more concerned about.”  
  
“You should be” Shaun smirked.  
  
What now? “What are you guys doing? Do I want to know?”  
  
Since when was their backyard a popular hangout with such high traffic? Shin nodded at Jill as she approached with her arms crossed. “Hello, imoto-chan. Come have a chat with us.”  
  
“Oh my God, why?” Jill groaned.  
  
“Hey, hey, no lip” Koji said dryly, “How are your grades? No BS, we’ll check you.”  
  
Jill stood between Nelly and Shin, blinking languidly, “I have all As but I _do_ have a low C in math. I am going to cram school, I _also_ don’t want any lip.”  
  
Glowering, Nelly grunted, “Oh yea? What’s all this late night weekday shit? You got a boyfriend?”  
  
“Did you ask Shaun that?” Jill demanded.  
  
Nelly tipped his head toward Shaun, drawing out, “You have a boyfriend, Shaun?”  
  
“…No.”  
  
Hmm? Shin blinked as Shaun looked a little offstandish. Odd but… “If you…wanted a boyfriend, I can’t speak for the others, but I would be okay with that.”  
  
“What are the rest of us, some assholes? Of course we’re okay with that” Koji snorted.  
  
Jill and Nelly nodded in agreement while Shaun looked a little startled. “W-Well, I-I don’t have a girlfriend or-or boyfriend! I like robots.”  
  
“Don’t worry, that’ll be a sexuality at the rate we’re going too.”  
  
“Not like that!”  
  
Shin laughed, “Way off topic, guys. Jill, you are also doing well in your first year of high school and we’re all proud of you both. If you need help with math, I will be available for a little while.”  
  
“Yes. And if you have a boyfriend, I’ll kill him” Koji nodded.  
  
“Wow, so you guys will let Tony two time two girls but I can’t have one boyfriend?” Jill leered.  
  
…Well, shit. Koji was dead silent as Nelly looked to Shin, appalled, “…I knew your call was crap, oldest! How the hell do we argue with that?!”

“I…”  
  
“What are you losers doing?”  
  
The final boss. Koji’s brow was twitching, indicating he was about on one percent patience right now. Tony looked at them like they were measly lowly beings. Shin took a breath. Okay. “…Talking about _you_.”  
  
“Oh really?”  
  
“Yea” Nelly said simply, crossing his arms, “We were asking the others about their grades in school right now. How are yours?”  
  
“What’s it to you?” he scoffed.  
  
Jill groaned, rubbing the bridge of her nose as Shaun snorted, “Nii-san’s not even been _going_ to school the last month.”  
  
“Hey!” Tony snapped, “I told you I’d beat you up if you told, Shaun!!”  
  
 _A month_? Koji chuckled. “I guess he figures he has the proper back up right now.”  
  
“S-So what? I’m not scared of you!” Tony spat, balling his fists.  
  
Shin honestly could only sigh when Koji managed to dry lift Tony off the ground by the front of his coat, shoving him against a post. “Wow, that month of missing school must’ve made you _dumb as a fuck then_!”  
  
“Ah!! Nii-san!” Jill pouted, grabbing Koji’s arm.  
  
Nelly looked…baffled. “Dude, what…what would make you skip school for a _month_? Why haven’t the teachers said anything?”  
  
The second youngest brother just looked annoyed. Shin gave Koji a look, “Let him talk to us, Koji.”  
  
While Koji looked far from prepared to do so, he lowered Tony to the ground and silently retrieved another cigarette out of his pocket. _Alas,_ Tony looked ready to stalk off. “Oi, dummy, you’re on our radar now. Where do you think you can run to?”  
  
“Just tell them, Tony” Jill sighed.  
  
Hmm? Tony stopped, crossing his arms. “…I hate school.”  
  
Shin blinked languidly, “…Kay.”  
  
“W-We all hate school so why should we be forced to go, huh?!” Tony hissed, wheeling back around, “Just wasting our whole lives just—just sitting in a stupid classroom learning boring shit all the time! And then I have to go work forever to make it?! It’s bullshit and you all know it!”  
  
Koji took a long puff, staring at Tony emptily before his dark eyes cut to Jill. “…You agree with this.”  
  
Their only sister grimaced, shrugging, “I-I don’t want to drop out or anything but I do hate school. Just…Tony decided to drop out and I didn’t.”  
  
Nelly gestured incredulously, saying in a mocking voice, “’Oh, okay, cool, that sounds great’. What _do_ you plan to do then, Tony?”

“What I want” he said sharply.  
  
“ _Om mani padme hum”_ Koji muttered lowly under his breath, covering his eyes.  
  
Yea, now _he_ was getting pissed off. Shin glared, “What…exactly do you grasp the human condition as, Tony? You say your plan is to ‘do what you want’? And what is that? Lie around? Have fun? Sleep with multiple girls? All of this, nonstop?”  
  
“Yea, what you guys do _without school_ and without the military!”  
  
Koji laughed. Oh no. “Oh _really_? With whose _money_ , dumbass?”  
  
Tony leered as Koji gestured at the younger crowd, “This goes for _all of you_ and you need to put this into _whatever_ you have going on in your heads: our dad? He came from fucking _nothing_. You have come from _something_ at every point in your _life_ so you don’t even grasp that he came from the _bottom_. He started working at the age of _ten,_ before you even had any idea what _working was_. He told me he worked as many as _three jobs_ in the past. I don’t know what the fuck the details are but you don’t work _three jobs_ because you want to. He raised Shin while he was fucking in _college_ and _working_. And you want to stand here barking that you ‘hate school’ and your big plan is to ‘do what you want’ which is _jackshit_?”  
  
Shin swallowed as Koji glared darkly, “Our mom didn’t have to work _at all_ if she didn’t want to but she does because she knew what _she_ wanted came with _work_. So I don’t know what flimsy shit ideas you all have in your heads about sitting around scratching your asses is but our parents aren’t going to play that shit with you. As long as you’re _trying_ , mom and dad will take care of you. As long as you’re _an adolescent_ , they have no choice. But the second your sorry asses hit sixteen, they can cut you slam the fuck off.”  
  
“And when that occurs? I can promise you, you will _not_ be able to do what you want _at all_ ” Shin added.  
  
Frowning, Jill looked up slowly, “…What if we don’t want to _go_ to college though, nii-sans?”  
  
“Then don’t go to college, imoto, we’re not holding a gun to your head to go that far” Koji sighed heavily, “But don’t expect to just be sitting around, twiddling your thumbs, that’s all I’m saying. It’s a society run off the fact that we contribute to it and I’d like to think the three of you aren’t selfish enough to expect only our parents to do the contributing in your name.”  
  
“Why not?” Tony scoffed, almost gritting his teeth, “We didn’t ask them to bring us into such a society.”  
  
“Neither did they or the other billion people in the universe. Take it up with the ancestors” Koji countered sarcastically.  
  
Nelly rolled his eyes, “And it may kill you guys to realize this, but our parents won’t always be here. And if by some miracle we have families? We won’t support you. Regardless. And if _you all_ have families, it’s the same. You don’t have to think about the future deeply but think about the garden you think you want to grow.”  
  
Jill looked startled while Shaun nodded, “I want to go to college and build robots.”  
  
“And that’s your garden, Shaun. If you want to grow roses now but decide down the line, you want sunflowers, that’s cool too” Nelly assured.  
  
“Your plot shouldn’t be fucking empty though” Koji uttered.  
  
Mm. Tony shivered, shaking his head, “…I don’t care. You won’t make me go back.”  
  
“…What in the world?”  
  
They all jumped about a mile, looking toward the opening of the deck near the stairs. A bit confusingly, Yagami Yamada was looking at them, bewilderment high in his blue eyes.   
  
“Uh…” Shin drawled, at a loss.  
  
“…I made sure I got a whole entire mansion for you all… and you’re outside, in Winter, convening under the deck.”  
  
Yep…that…was what they were doing. Tony was silent before huffing, stalking off toward the front yard. Their dad gazed after him before tilting his head, “C’mon, I bought pizza for dinner and your mom just pulled up. Maybe we can hear whatever this titillating banter you have going that has you out in this frigid weather.”  
  
Jill grimaced, wandering to hug his side, “…You probably wouldn’t like it, papa.”  
  
“Oh?”  
  
“…We’ll be in in a second, pop” Koji murmured.  
  
“…Okay. And stop smoking, you’re killing yourselves.”  
  
Koji waved him off, Shaun following after them back up the deck. Listening for the door to close to the house, Nelly grunted, “Idiot. Balls drop and think he’s some sort of genius or some shit.”  
  
“If he’s dropped out…” Shin muttered, “…He can’t get back _in_. He’d have to reapply and he might end up graduating with Shaun.”  
  
“Then let him, smart ass that he is” Koji sneered. “…I didn’t think we were _that_ bad an example coming up. Yea, the parties, the drinking…”  
  


“Balance. I thought we showed them balance” Nelly sighed.  
  
…Were they balanced? Maybe…it just looked too hard. Koji looked exhausted because he was trying to speed through college, Nelly looked exhausted because…who knows, and he…he didn’t sleep every night because corpses were haunting him.  
  
…Was there balance here?  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _Fine. They all had an internal code they followed: no snitching unless it was life or death._

_As they were setting out plates for the pizza their dad had brought, Shin noticed Jill looked troubled as she put out glasses. Okay, would he prefer her to go to college? Probably. But who was he to say that when even he wasn’t going right now? So Shin patted her on the shoulder and murmured, “It doesn’t matter if you don’t go to university, imoto. Just…you know, high school is like the BARE MINIMUM unless you’re thinking about being an idol or something…”  
  
Jill snickered, “No way, nii-san. No, no, I…I think I get what Koji is saying. And Nelly too, if…if we do have our own families one day, I would be expected to do something. Even…even if I don’t, I can’t be a leech. Tony is just frustrated though, he felt…trapped.”  
  
…Mm. It was trapping. Eight hours in school, two hours in cram school if necessary, and two hours of studying? That was twelve hours, half a day. Put into account that they ought to be getting eight hours of sleep, that left…four hours of free time? That was like a sixth of the day. No, he GOT it. He just wasn’t comfortable Tony understood that the trade off wasn’t having 24 hours of free time.  
  
So, yea, he broke the no snitching on this one.  
  
Yagami Yamada and Dana stared at them as they relayed the information that apparently Tony had dropped out of school. They all kind of…squirmed. Oops. Finally, his dad leaned back, quietly eating his pizza again and sipping his lemonade. His mother folded her fingers and smiled. “I’m gonna kill him.”  
  
Meep. “Mom…”  
  
“So what HAS he been doing then, Jill? Shaun?” Dana questioned, pinning them with a look.  
  
Jill winced and wiped her hands, “…Um, what…whatever he wants. I think he said sometimes he goes to the arcade or walks around the mall…”  
  
Yagami Yamada smiled. It was a weird smile and often Shin got the creeping suspicion again that really his dad was just the original version of Koji. He was probably about to break this table in half. “…Imagine. Imagine…I have a son that drops out of school to hang around the mall.”  
  
Tony’s twin looked a little shocked before blinking slowly, “…Well, when you…put it like that…”  
  
When you put it THAT way to a person like their dad, Tony was comparably a brat. Just… “I will say, dad, that it’s been indicated he feels trapped, that…that he’s wasting his time in school when as soon as he’s finished with it, he has to go right to working his life away” Shin added.  
  
Their father was gentling massaging the bridge of his nose, silent as they all dared to nibble while he apparently…thought on what to say. However, after about eight solid minutes, he finally said: “…I can’t handle this one, Dana. I…I don’t have this life experience, I had the ENTIRE opposite.”  
  
Damn. Dana scoffed, dabbing her lips, “Yama, I don’t think EITHER of us have this life experience. Trapped? Trapped in an affluent school with decent allowances and the freedom to do what he wants as long as his grades are good? Just ‘good’, not excellent or above and beyond? And not once have we insisted any child of ours just HAS to go to college? Meanwhile, when you were his age you HAD to work three jobs to pay rent? And when I was his age, I was engaged to a psychopath and expected to stay sheltered until I married him? I’m sorry, this isn’t one we’re going to relate to well.”  
  
“Maybe he feels trapped by that feeling, mama, papa” Shaun said slowly.  
  
Hmm? Nelly frowned toward the youngest before nodding, “…Do I feel sometimes like I don’t have room to complain when I remember where you’re coming from? Yea.”  
  
Koji grabbed another slice of pizza, blinking slowly, “…Well, yea. But I don’t know if my response is spit on all their efforts and not do anything.”  
  
Yamada looked…aghast. “…You kids don’t owe us anything, I-I would never want you to feel that way. And I’ve always said I don’t want this to be a competition. Whatever it is you’re going through, I want to hear it. Whatever I WENT through, that’s got no bearing on what it is you’re feeling now. And…I’ll figure out a way to commiserate with Tony. I guess he would keep this a secret if that’s how you all are considering it.”  
  
Yes, Shin imagined Tony was a little intimidated by the idea of telling his dad that ‘school was too hard’ when, again, the man was working three jobs as a child to make sure he had a roof over his head and food. Or the mom that bore them while forcibly married to a yakuza bastard. It was…complicated.  
  
Tomato sauce.  
  
Staring at the empty box before him as the other’s chatter turned to a dull hum in his ears, Shin stared at the miscellaneous dripping of sauce. Dripping…like the blood…in the maze…  
  
He inhaled sharply, refocusing with a rapid shake of the head. He excused himself to go rinse his face in his room, dizzy and nauseous. What he was feeling now, huh…?  
  
…Fucking crazy. He…he told his dad he wanted to do this because it was the right thing. To tell him that doing the right thing was ripping his sanity a part?  
  
…He guessed he could commiserate with Tony on that much. Some things weren’t an easy conversation to have.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
_

“I can’t believe…we just found out our younger brother has dropped out of school…and you two still wanted to come to this party.”  
  
Yagami Shin was honestly in disbelief when, after he got himself together, he came out of his bathroom and found the twins in his room indicating they were ‘ready to go’. The party with Nesha was so far out of his head but meanwhile those two were hyped up.  
  
So, advising he didn’t desire to stay long, the three of them left their family home in Subami to travel into Wasaba, the birthplace of their father. Once again, he parked in the apartment building in North Wasaba and they started to walk west. Koji was smoking a cigarette as they made this venture, his hands in his pockets. “I can’t believe we’re walking in fucking two degree weather.”  
  
“Look, I know my car is older now but the radio is still pretty valuable” grunted Shin.  
  
“Man, you’re right, it’s already been four years” Nelly gasped, “Time flies.”  
  
Yea, it did…he turned 20 in a week. His first year without…  
  
…Shut the fuck up, Shin. Growing disgusted with himself, he grunted to Koji, “Let me have one of your fancy black cigarettes.”  
  
Was he _surprised_ when Koji instead handed him a piece of nicotine gum? No, but he sure wanted to fight his ass. “I don’t _want gum_.”  
  
“Look, all three of us can’t die from lung cancer, bro.”  
  
“Then _you_ chew the gum and give _me_ the cigarette!”  
  
“Testy, testy” Koji sang, “You’re already on your way to weaning.”  
  
Shin calculated if maybe he could now take Koji. He was military trained to subdue an offender. Except, as scary as it was to think, the Zechs were still slightly more predictable than this guy. Grudgingly popping the gum into his mouth, he raised a brow as they got closer, noting a lot of people were hanging around the building. Some of the guys gave them looks as they walked in and Shin wondered if there was going to be trouble.  
  
Koji snickered suddenly, having been holding up the back, “Wow, nii-san, they’re talking about you hanging around this Nesha.”  
  
“What?” Shin scowled.  
  
“Said you were fucking around with her and she’s all hung up over you.”  
  
“You sure heard a lot in the five seconds we were passing” Shin snorted, “It’s not like that, we’re just…well, we’re just screwing around.”  
  
Nelly grinned, walking up the steps behind him, “And sounds like you’re her current screw of choice, oldest. I mean, how hot is she if you got them jealous of even the sight of you?”  
  
Rolling his eyes, Shin noticed people were almost spilling into the hallway from the designated apartment. All sorts of combinations of people were leaning against the wall, either chattering, making out, or seemingly about to take it a little further. Koji and Nelly seemed unbothered but Shin was definitely not used to the type of PDA where a couple were about to have penetrative sex in the hallway with a dozen other people around.   
  
Entering the apartment, it wasn’t that much better, people were just on the _couch_ about to have penetrative sex. Shin gawked when he saw a group of girls snorting cocaine off a coffee table. Oh, hell no, they had to leave. “We gotta go, if this gets busted, my ass is grass.”  
  
Koji snorted. “They don’t bust Wasaba parties, Shin. They want them to OD and die.”  
  
Well, that got dark in absolutely zero seconds. Before he could respond to this, he heard a gasp, “Hey! You made it!”  
  
Shin looked to the voice and his eyes widened. Today, Nesha had on a short, _short_ black leather mini skirt and a lined white mid-tank mid-drift, her green eyes popping with dark liner. She just kind of made his mind soup, honestly.  
  
He wasn’t surprised when she came up to him, hugging his neck and kissing him hard. That was pretty much the beginning of most of their interactions. Just, today, had…company. “A-Ah, Nesha, bef-before that, the-these are my brothers, Koji and Nerimaru. Nerimaru, Koji, this is Nesha.”  
  
Nesha frowned, looking to them before she gasped again. “Oh my GOD, I’ve never seen identical twins before! This is awesome!”  
  
“A-Uh, yes…” Nelly drawled, “T-Thanks for having us.”  
  
Koji didn’t say anything, just kind of staring before nodding. Yea, she had that effect. Nesha clapped her hands, “Thanks for coming! Such a sexy ass family too. Oh, I just remembered I have to go get something from my sister. I will be right back! Get yourself some drinks or weed!”  
  
She started to scurry off…but berated someone that dropped a smoldering joint on the ground, bending down, rather agile, to get it up before darting off. Koji stared before looking to Shin, bewildered, “…Oh my God, I hate you?”  
  
“That is just handpicked perfection” whistled Nelly, “Enough it makes you wonder.”  
  
“Yea, yea” Shin snorted, wandering over to where the drinks were. What could he say though? She was pretty damn beautiful. Three guys had caught and were talking to her, googly-eyed. Just…lust, Shin.  
  
The Yagami sons stood around for a _few_ minutes together, sipping a simple vodka and tonic while they chatted. Alas, like the college parties he’d gone with the two to, girls came over to flirt with them. Another cute blonde was hitting on him…when Odette came over, telling the girl that ‘Nesha will beat your ass’ before exiting. Shin watched in honest amazement as the girl quickly walked away. Koji and Nelly smirked a him before being taken off individually by the women interested in them…well, damn! What if Nesha went off with another guy??   
  
Sitting on the couch, sipping his drink, he observed the amount of…human relations taking place. No, he wasn’t watching people bang but people were doing drugs, playing cards, or dancing. It was actually kind of fascinating.   
  
Shin people watched for about 45 minutes but was over it. Prepared to ask his brothers if they were ready to leave, his eyes widened when Nesha finally came back over with a joint. “Sorry about that, Shin. Sometimes you have to…assuage some egos.”  
  
Raising a brow as she sat beside him on the couch, resting her legs in his lap, Shin drawled, “…I see. Did they…assuage yours?”  
  
“Well now, that’s why I called _you_. With them, there’s literally _no_ guarantee of…assuaging, but you? Never a question” she blinked slowly at him, tucking a strand of his hair behind his ear.  
  
Huh. “Glad to be of service, I s’pose…” he murmured, gazing at her.  
  
Despite the fact the last time they did drugs together, it…didn’t go exactly how it should have, like it should have anything, he accepted the blunt when she passed it to him. He inhaled, knowing how to draw and everything…he was okay with weed in so much that it did absolutely nothing to him. This alcohol was more of a risk than this. Nesha took it back, just seeming…calmer. “…What made you join the army, Shin?”  
  
“Hmm? Oh…I saw a news special. They had babies in cages and were putting all these people in the ground. I…I wanted to help” he muttered. That…sanitized version got him there.  
  
Nesha shook her head, drawling, “People here need help too though.”  
  
“I know…but, I dunno, I…guess I feel like the people over there are helpless and I can do something about it. Here, I…don’t know how to fight this kind of helplessness.”  
  
Oops, maybe too deep for their ‘relationship’. However, Nesha nodded, “Yea, you’re right. Over there it’s an evil villain trying to hurt mostly innocent people. Black and white. Here, this spectrum of gray…where do you even begin? What do you tackle first? I get it.”  
  
“…Kind of wish it was black and white” he murmured, “I don’t think I’d feel as bad.”  
  
“What do you feel?”  
  
“…Like a monster. Like…I don’t deserve to come home.”  
  
Her brows furrowed and he _knew_ that was too deep. The alcohol had his tongue loose. Nesha shook her head, drawling, “I don’t know what to tell you on that one, Shin. A gang member will drive through here and shoot into a playground then go to sleep at ease right after. You might have ended up killing someone that was raping women and children and murdering them and you feel like a monster or don’t deserve to come home? Get your priorities straight.”  
  
Shin grimaced, rubbing his forehead. Right, right, bad people were bad and he was killing bad people. Just… “That gang member in that scenario…why did they do it?”  
  
“A whole litany of reasons, I’m sure” Nesha shrugged, “Money, tyranny—depression. Fact is though, Shin, you have other avenues available. When is just randomly killing people gonna be an answer to whatever their situation is?”  
  
…Right. Right. End of the day, these people…were hanging up severed limbs in a room to terrorize people. He didn’t want their lives on his hands but…they sure didn’t mind having life on theirs. His nose wrinkled, taking the joint back from Nesha and taking a deep puff. “What about you, Nesha?”  
  
“What about me?”  
  
“I mean…what are your plans?”  
  
“I’ll speak my plans when I know they’re coming true. In the meantime, they’re just ‘plans’.”  
  
Shin made a face before having to nod, “Gotcha. Guess all I’m doing is ‘planning’ too.”  
  
“Your case, you should speak it into existence. You have a lot more riding on what you’re doing than I do…all I’ve got riding over here is affecting me alone.”  
  
Mm. She slid completely face forward into his lap, kissing him deeply. He tasted the sweet flavor of the paper on her lips as he set down his glass, hugging her tightly to his body. He…

  
…Was _not_ making out in a room full of people! Sulking, he pulled away and pouted, “Look, Nesha, might be the ‘bougie’ side of me but I cannot…perform in a room full of people.”  
  
Nesha smirked, “I dunno, your brother seems to be doing fine.”  
  
What? Glancing over his shoulder, there was another loveseat or something. It was the back of one of the twin’s heads he saw but he was a bit disturbed by one of the women who had approached him currently bucking up and down on his lap. Oh…wow. “…And now I have to leave the room for other reasons, oh my God.”  
  
With a snicker, Nesha grasped his hand to pull him to stand, leading him to _yet another_ broom closet. Dang, they had a bed! Sighing, he pulled her back against his chest, kissing her neck as he worked to get her going. “Mm, Shin…? You don’t mind wearing a condom, do you?”  
  
… “Uh, a-actually, I would _prefer_ to.” Crap, they’d had sex…several times now and he wasn’t even _thinking_ about protection.  
  
Nesha did glower a bit back at him, “Oh, because now other dick has been inside of me?”  
  
“Because I have had one too many pregnancy scares in my life already.”  
  
She smiled, pulling a condom out of her shirt to unravel and roll out over his shaft, “You a daddy, Shin?”  
  
Swallowing, he simply shook his head. Nesha kissed him teasingly, nipping at his jaw, “Mmm, too bad we’ll only ever be fuck buddies, our children would be gorgeous…”  
  
Children. He wondered if he’d have children. Children to pass this fucked up world on to. Turning her back around, bending her over against the wall, he murmured, “Yea…too bad.”  
  
…Their children would have been gorgeous too.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _“Shin? You ready to go?”  
  
…Okay, maybe Nesha had different weed than he’d tried.  
  
Shin had dozed off on the couch apparently, something he didn’t even recall doing, Nesha fast asleep against his side. While they’d been screwing in the closet, he started TRIPPING BALLS. Everything was like a weird painting or he was in that a-ha video. Whatever, and he meant WHATEVER, Nesha had access to he had no business taking. It was…kind of fun banging a 2D Nesha though?  
  
…Honestly, he couldn’t recall if Nesha finished or not, but given she hadn’t spurned him and was curled up with him, he must’ve done okay. Looking to his side where Koji was lighting up a cigarette, Shin nodded slowly. “…Yea. Where’s Nelly?”  
  
He caught a glimpse of a clock, it was three in the morning but Nelly was still talking to a brunette young woman…Koji smirked toward him, drawling, “Nell, you coming home with us, futago?”_

_  
Nerimaru leered back at him and Koji’s smirk widened, “Nope. Let’s go, Shin.”  
  
Wha? Shin gave Nelly a look before shaking his head, moving his arm from behind Nesha’s head. She stirred a bit, looking at him languidly, “Leavin’?”  
  
“Yea. You…safe amongst all these miscellaneous people?” he drawled, looking around and seeing a lot of sleeping bodies.  
  
_

_Nesha stretched, rubbing her eyes, “…Mm, I probably will go back to my place.”  
  
It was a trifle awkward but she walked back with them toward the apartment building he temporarily stayed in, Koji just silently smoking his cigarette while Nesha was almost sleep walking. Frankly…for the first time, Shin was a little nervous walking around Wasaba. The people out at three in the damn morning looked like the type of people that would just be loitering the streets at 3 am for no reason. He glared when one of the guys whistled at Nesha and asked ‘how much?’.   
  
She completely ignored the guy and Shin shivered with irritation when the bastard hooted to ‘have fun with the two hafu’. God, he hated people sometimes…Koji suddenly snickered. “I don’t know if it was a GOOD idea to leave the car in North Wasaba or a bad idea.”  
  
Definitely was 50/50 right now which meant they probably shouldn’t have been there to begin with. Relieved when they arrived at Nesha’s place, he walked her upstairs to make sure she could get in. She snorted at him, “Not one of your Subami girls, Shin.”  
  
“Nesha, I don’t know what the hell you had in that pot but you’re not enough of a Wasaba girl for me to not make sure you’re not too high to get into your apartment.”  
  
“Cheeky fucker” she snickered, pulling her keys out of the pocket of her leather jacket.  
  
Shin closed his eyes as she pulled him roughly against her, kissing him hard, “Mmm, if your brother wasn’t waiting for you, I would say come in for a little morning fuck…”  
  
“Well, I’m a little sleepy so maybe I’ll take you up on that another time” Shin replied, a little uncertain what level of affection was appropriate here so he let her call the shots.  
  
She patted his chest, blinking at him solemnly, “…Don’t lose sleep over other people’s bullshit, Shin.”  
  
“…I’ll try. Night, Nesha.”  
  
Wandering out of the building, yawning, he climbed into driver’s side of the car. Koji was cuddled up in the passenger seat like he was asleep. Shin knew better. “I think she’s a little tougher than what I’ve seen you go for.”  
  
“That would be why we’re just screwing around” Shin assured, putting the key into the ignition.  
  
“I don’t mean to say she would be BAD for you, just…well, it’d be different. If you’re both agreeing it’s for fun, no harm there” Koji murmured.  
  
Shin eased out on the street before cutting his eyes at Koji momentarily, “…I just wish you’d get your mind out of the gutter. It won’t happen. That’s dead and done. I don’t even want to think about it.”  
  
Koji smiled. What? “I think YOU think about her more than I do, Shin. Nesha could work if you wanted to—hell, Naomi could if you both wanted it to. All of it could possibly work if both parties want it to. I don’t recommend shit because I’m not the one that can make it work. So, I am not recommending you reconcile with anyone you don’t want to under any circumstance.”  
  
“Good.”  
  
“Could’ve worked though.”  
  
Shin stared into the deep darkness ahead of him, all of the buildings closed for a few more hours. There was very little light except the sparse few streetlamps ahead of them. The road seemed so much longer._

_…Yea…it could have.  
  
_ Yagami Shin did not miss holding a gun. He also very much did not miss these fatigues.  
  
Miserably walking into his brother’s dorm, he shook his head. He was just going to training for the weekend but…he really just had hoped to have a solid break. He’d be back to this full time in _June_. Now he got to go shoot targets shaped like people for two days then go celebrate his birthday two days later. Life was kind of nuts…  
  
He had a little time before the bus came though so he thought he’d pop in and share his ‘research’ with Koji. Knocking on the dorm door, he raised a brow when he heard Koji say sleepily, “Come in…”  
  
Opening the door, Shin gave his brother a look. His first thought was the man was sick. Now he knew he was hung the hell over, draped across the small couch in the one room like he was on his last leg. “Koji…do you _have_ to party that hard _all the time_?”  
  
“That damn Everclear almost did me in this time…” Koji droned, his hand draped over his eyes, “That or the 151…”  
  
“…Which you drank both in the same night.”  
  
“Yea…”  
  
They probably tag-teamed and almost took him out, the dummy. Shin sighed and took a copy of a piece of paper from his bag to give to Koji. “For you to keep and ponder.”  
  
Koji weakly accepted the image, staring at it with half open eyes…before one of his brows dropped. “…What am I looking at here?”  
  
“Shaun’s soul.”  
  
“…Pardon?”  
  
Yesterday, Shin decided to do a pop in on some of Shaun’s teachers. Wednesday, he had done so for Jill and confirmed the information she had given was correct. Thursday, he checked on Tony and also confirmed that he had not been there for…well, a little bit more than a month. What they hadn’t known was he essentially submitted the paperwork to drop out. On the one hand, that was irritating, on the other, it…was kind of responsible? Shin hadn’t seen the kid since the blow up, so…

Shaun’s information was also truthful so Shin mostly targeted his energy to this art situation. The teacher was a middle-aged woman who looked…dismayed? She advised him that Shaun was ‘not living up to his potential on purpose’. Shin tried to protest that that was a very difficult call to make in something like art. He had thought about it and Shaun wasn’t even that kid that would give them pictures of things he drew, really. Like, he’d draw squares to make robots or whatever but like, organic things? Never.  
  
That’s when the woman, deadpan, brought out this picture that Shaun drew. She gave them some very…metaphysical philosophical topic to draw what they thought their soul looked like. All media was available so the options were endless. Apparently Yagami Shaun chose a white piece of paper with a pencil and drew what appeared to be a potato with stick arms, stick legs, two hollow circle eyes and a simple smile. Shin had taken the piece of paper and stared at it long and hard in the midst of the woman before clearing his throat. He’d explained that Shaun was a very…interesting child.  
  
The teacher indicated she was well aware and that, perhaps, Shaun needed to be told to think _within_ the box. Shin had never heard such a depressing suggestion in his life…but his brother literally thought his soul was a potato so, maybe he did need to bring things back into a…smaller perspective.   
  
Shin sighed, sitting down on a desk chair Koji had, waving a hand, “The art teacher wanted the kids to draw their souls. They had access to all colors of paper, all types of paints and pencils and hues…Shaun took a white piece of paper, drew a black and white potato with a face, and turned it in.”  
  
Koji continued to gaze at the piece before replying: “Well…glad _you_ made that visit…because there was no way I was making it through that meeting with a straight face.”  
  
Shin snickered as Koji cracked up, shaking his head, “What the hell is wrong with that kid? I swear.”  
  
Smirking, Shin also shook his head, “I had to ask…he said it was because a potato was capable of being so many different things—French fries, a baked potato, pierogis…it’s capabilities, per his words, ‘are endless’. I mean, what could I really say to that?”  
  
“Ah, Shaun, you sweet child. Don’t ever change” laughed Koji, managing to pull himself up and stagger to his desk.  
  
Watching him tape the picture over his desk, Shin smiled some. “…I told him, just for this lady, to think ‘within the box’ and see where it got him. I felt bad even telling him that shit but there was this weird…glimmer in his eye like something just clicked so we’ll see what happens.”  
  
Koji sat down on the couch again, musing, “…It _is_ possible he wasn’t restraining his thoughts and the possibilities, he’s got a pretty vast imagination. Sometimes the big picture doesn’t fit a small frame.”  
  
Huh. Shin pondered over that as Koji shut his eyes. “…We always kind of joked about how weird he is but he is a good kid. He wants me to help him build a motorcycle from scratch. And I told dad and he says he wants to help as well when he can which Shaun finds exciting.”  
  
“Dad was a mechanic at some point, right?” Koji yawned.  
  
“So he says…”  
  
“Jack of all trades, man. What about the other kid?” Koji questioned dryly.  
  
Shaking his head, Shin sighed gravely, “…I think mom and dad are at a loss? Like, any way you look at it, Tony’s gone off the rails. Jill might say she ‘agrees’ but her grades are almost immaculate. I just…don’t get it.”  
  
Shrugging, Koji yawned, “He’ll either figure it out or he won’t. All mom and dad can do is start charging him rent or something, they can’t put him out and all they can do as far as school is drop him off. They can’t make him study or even stay.”  
  
…Sad. Shin frowned, sighing, “…Maybe I should have just stayed at home and got a job so I could see them through.”  
  
“Idiot” Koji snorted, “It’s not _you_ that made Tony go off the tracks. Like I said, they’re growing up, it’s time for them to learn from their mistakes.”  
  
“…Koji.”  
  
“Wha?”  
  
“…I think I made a mistake.”  
  
His brother looked to him slowly, confused. Shin gripped his forehead and felt…dread. He…he was talking about not wanting to go to basic. He was almost to the point he didn’t want to go back _at all_. Now that he was home again, he…he wanted to _stay_. He could have a decent life here, he didn’t…  
  
Didn’t want to see anymore suffering…  
  
“Shin, bro, I can’t tell you I know what you’re going through or what you saw” Koji said softly, “…But I don’t think you made a mistake. I just think it was more traumatic than you were expecting. Winning a war…is not fulfilling. There’s going to be bloodshed.”  
  
… “…You’re right” Shin whispered, “I thought it was going to be fulfilling, like I…I was doing these people a favor. Maybe I am, maybe I’m not? This…this isn’t fulfilling at all.”  
  
“Well…you want a medal?”  
  
Shin smirked some, shutting his eyes, “…Nah, I want people to stop being shit.”  
  
“Ha, don’t hold your breath. You’ve done a good thing, Shin. And bro, honest, you might go and have fun this weekend.”  
  
Yea right! Fun. He…  
  
He was going back in two months. Fun.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

  
 **End Notes:**  
  
So, of course, Google translate is still a bit sketchy. Some of those lines probably _don’t_ translate to ‘what do you mean?’ but okay. Additional, almuhtal probably doesn’t mean fraud either but, for our purposes.  
  


So, I’ve mentioned this in a few other stories but it was my cousin’s childhood innocent remark that rendered the name ‘Nelly’. I basically advised her she should marry Elli and she was like ‘if she’s Elli then he needs to be Nelly!” and the rest is history. This was, naturally, circa the intro of 2000s rapper, Nelly. The song that Shin is like ‘well, that’s crazy’ is ‘Shake Ya’ Ass/Shake It Fast’ by Mystikal, another 2000s rapper.  
  
Naomi is based on one of the playable protagonists from the new remake. You can possibly take ‘Mako’ for the male character.  
  
So, the drink that Shin is calling ‘Cell from DBZ’ is called The Incredible Hulk. It’s a blend of Hpnotiq and Hennessey…aka, _why_?  
  
Marilyn Manson is occasionally mentioned throughout the series but the king of shock rock, he probably really isn’t Shin’s cup of tea…  
  
Joe was hanging around with Shino, a nod to Rune Factory 3. It is supposed to be, by real standards, pretty rare to go from, say, the Army to the Navy as an inter-service transfer.  
  
So this one _might_ have flown over some heads but Nesha is a slant to _Ganesha_ from Rune Factory Frontier. While I’ve of course kept names like “Popuri” and a few other bizarre ones, Ganesha just seemed odd. Ganesha was the elfin blacksmith in the game. Odette is from Tides of Destiny/Oceans.  
  
Ecstasy doesn’t _necessarily_ work this way from what I’ve researched but hey, maybe the Harvest Moon mushrooms make them act differently.

Inuyasha was an anime that came out around the time setting of this series and I’m HYPED about the sequel I didn’t know what coming around the time I wrote this!!   
  
When Tony is explaining his plans to the older siblings, Koji mutters the Buddhist chant “ _Om mani padme hum”._ It’s supposed to provide a clear mind and enlightenment.  
  
Shin’s talking about the iconic a-ha video ‘Take on Me’ which is still pretty neat if you haven’t seen it, even if it’s from the 80s.


	11. A House on Fire

**Chapter 11** : A House on Fire  
  
 **Author’s Notes:** Whoop, whoop, keeping up with goals! So yea, same as last chapter, AO3 has smuttacular and FF, you get the not so smuttacular. But, amongst that smut, if you have read some of my other works, you get to see an overlap! Enjoy~  
  


XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_That was always the crazy thing about Yagami Koji: sometimes he’d say something that sounded absolutely ridiculous but it just…kind of came true.  
  
Shin had to convince himself to do the proper steps and march to base because he was almost dragging his very soul at that point when they got off the bus. The sergeant called roll and sent them to put their duffel bags away. This time they were at least given the luxury of a, albeit tiny, private room. Well, it was only two days.  
  
Returning to lineup, he paused. Across the way was none other than Akiyama Joe. What now?  
  
Shin tried hard not to stare at him, just a bit perplexed because he just told Shin he was going to be transferred to the marines. They hadn’t really talked since but, uh, what?   
  
When they were sent to just run obstacle courses, he was able to sort of get near Joe. “Dude, I thought you were transferring.”  
  
“Not until June when you go” Joe explained, “Until then, I just need to be in tiptop shape in general.”  
  
Oh… “Well, that’s cool. Guess we’ll be running the same basic schedule then.”  
  
Joe winked, “Just make sure your ass can keep up, Yagami. Heard you were busy partying on the low, you might not have the stamina.”  
  
“Oh really?” Shin leered, “We’ll see.”  
  
To be frank, Joe wasn’t a hundred percent wrong, the first rope Shin hit trying to cross the sandpit, he felt like he was asking his body to rip apart a piece of steel. However, seeing Joe power through out of the corner of his eye irked him enough to start gunning it too. Tuh! Joe hadn’t even been to active combat yet, the ass!  
  
So that was pretty much it? Childish, really, but he spent the entirety of the weekend so preoccupied with making sure Joe wasn’t one upping him completely in athletics and shooting, he was startled when they were dismissed to go home. Joe grinned, his duffel bag on his shoulder, smacking Shin’s back. “You’re a good motivation, Shin. Different than these other dudes!”  
  
“Yea…for real though, thanks, Joe. I was really dreading this and now I’m shocked how fast it was over.”  
  
“Of course, dude. Gotta have a motivation.”  
  
…Yes. Joe glanced at his leather watch before tipping his head, “I drove here. Wanna ride back with me? We can get a beer.”  
  
“Sounds good.”  
  
“Great. Can’t wait to hear how you’re banging the current patron goddess of Wasaba” Joe smirked, walking over to an old maroon with white stripes down the hood Chevelle.   
  
Shin snorted, “Like I can’t wait to hear where you got this thing.”  
  
“Your mom.”  
  
“You know what, fucker--”  
  
Joe laughed as Shin glowered at him, opening the door, “Chill, bro. I was not making some sexual joke about your mom, of all people. She told one of her old Wasaba friends who told my grandpa that she knew a client that was trying to get rid of a Chevelle. My grandpa got it for me for completing boot camp.”  
  
Raising a brow, Shin sat down in the passenger side. It had that old leather smell and everything was slightly torn. “…I didn’t think my mom had old Wasaba friends.”  
  
“Your mom’s a legend there too, dummy.”  
  
“Not according to ‘Mick’ or whatever the hell that guy’s name was” scoffed Shin, still not over the disrespect.  
  
Old or new, muscle cars were just designed to be somewhat…loud. The engine could possibly rip a steel post down though, he thought absently, listening to it roar as Joe floored it toward the highway. Joe played with the radio, apparently cassette, A-track, nor CD available. _

Strollin' to the party like my name is El Nino. Well, I'm hangin' out drinking in the back of an El Camino. As a kid, was a skid, and no one knew me by name. I trashed my own house party cause nobody came. Well, I know I'm not the one you thought you knew back in high school. Never going, never showing up when we had to. Attention that we crave, don't tell us to behave, I'm sick of always hearing act your age. I don't want to waste my time; become another casualty of society. I'll never fall in line; Become another victim of your conformity and back down.  
  
 _“…What the hell is this?” Shin questioned.  
  
“I dunno, pop punk? Skate punk?”  
  
Shin groaned. “Sounds like my little brother’s eventual anthem. Maybe ‘punk’ incited him to rebel. He decided to drop out of high school because he ‘hates school’ and he doesn’t want to go straight from school to working himself into the grave.”  
  
Which sounded like logic the likes of Joe would agree with, really. Alas, Joe shook his head, “Wish my ass had been able to go to high school, maybe I wouldn’t be out here risking my neck.”  
  
Grimacing, Shin sighed, “Yea…”  
  
“But, in your situation, I guess he would look at it like ‘why bother?’. He’s not struggling, he’s not living meal to meal or worried his family won’t be able to eat—ya’ll got a big ass house over his head, drive nice vehicles, have nice things—what’s it to him to go to school?”  
  
“He didn’t earn a bit of it, he’s just basking in the glory of it” Shin complained, “And what if something, God forbid, happens to our parents? I can tell you now, the mansion would be the first thing to go because me and twins could not afford that mortgage payment.”  
  
Joe shrugged, “You’re speaking in hypotheticals, man. IF something happened. Right now, your parents are strong as fuck and life is good. You can’t use a hypothetical future to make him do right now in the present.”  
  
…Damn. “…Maybe. But any way you look at it, unless he does something spectacular, he is really messing up here and he would have to spend that same hypothetical future fixing it. Like, I don’t believe in the ‘suffer now and enjoy life later’ mantra but don’t set yourself up for failure either.”  
  
“Are we messing up?”  
  
“What?”  
  
“Are we messing up?” Joe repeated.  
  
… “…Possibly. Probably.”_

_“Life’s a fucking mess, Shin. All we can try to do is sort through the puzzle and make decisions that look like they might work. It might work out for your brother, it might not. For all we know, staying in high school wouldn’t help him either. We know from experience it certainly wouldn’t HURT him but life’s a bitch.”  
  
Sounded tired and contrived…but that also sounded like life and Shin wasn’t a fan. “…You mind if I smoke? It’s cool, if not. I’m funny about the twins smoking in my car too.”  
  
“Shit, what happened to you over there?” Joe took a moment to raise a brow at him, “Sure, knock yourself out.”  
  
Shin sighed and pulled one of the white cylinders out of the pack, sticking it in his mouth, and lighting up. Reaching for the handle to pump the window down a smidge, he absently glanced as the radio shifted somewhere else._

Crawling in my skin. These wounds, they will not heal. Fear is how I fall, confusing what is real. There’s something inside me that pulls beneath the surface: Consuming, confusing. This lack of self-control I fear is never ending. Controlling, I can’t seem…to find myself again. My walls are closing in. _Without a sense of confidence I’m convinced that there’s just too much pressure to take._ I’ve felt this way before, so insecure. Crawling in my skin, these wounds they will not heal. Fear is how I fall, confusing what is real. Discomfort endlessly has pulled itself upon. Distracting, reacting against my will I stand beside my own reflection; it’s haunting how I can’t seem to find myself again, my walls are closing in.

_…Shin exhaled a billow of smoke, murmuring, “…Shit, music has gotten dark.”  
  
“You ever really listen to the previous generation, man? It’s just more blunt now, shit’s always been dark.”  
  
He hadn’t thought about it in years…but yes, he did remember actually listening to the Nirvana lyrics. Some of it was so tortured but it was…so solemn. When he listened to Pearl Jam’s Black, there was…definitely suffering. This guy, whoever he was, he’d ask Koji, he…sounded like he might be in pain.  
  
…Was that living?_

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
Hybrid Theory. Linkin Park. Per Koji’s review, ‘Little overdramatic, but really gets you thinking sometimes. Good album’.  
  
Shin raised a brow as he listened to it on the CD player in their small garage, currently buffing the body of perhaps a Yamaha while ‘Runaway’ echoed in the background. Shaun wanted it to be dark blue with specks of lighter blue or something. He looked up at Shaun who was working intensely on the mechanical portions. “…As awesome as this is Shaun, maybe we could just…get a job together and buy you a bike. I’d trust it more.”  
  
“Nah, I want a keepsake” Shaun said simply.  
  
Mmkay. Making a face, Shin shook his head, “I definitely want a professional to look it over before we try it then. Mom’s not blaming me for her baby’s neck being broken.”  
  
“Dad’s a professional, right?”  
  
“…Maybe once upon a time?”  
  
Shaun looked up, his dark eyes aglow, “But dad knew how to drive a whole motorcycle! I thought he was a dork!”  
  
Shin snickered, grabbing a lower grit of sandpaper, “Stop it.”  
  
It was an unusual birthday but his dad took the day off and took all of them, minus Tony as he was MIA, to some kind of track. While through miscellaneous life experiences, he, Koji, and Nelly knew how to ride motorcycles, Shaun and Jill were novices…which was weird because Shaun wanted Shin to build a motorcycle with him. But their dad rented them all training motorcycles and taught the two youngest how to maintain balance. Jill was a bit fearful at first but once she got the hang of it, she was riding around with them at ease.   
  
He guessed once his dad was satisfied they wouldn’t imminently die, he got on a Harley which was a weirdly American choice. While never in a million years would they have imagined their mom would be okay with any of this type of danger, she hopped on the back at ease. He…very vaguely recalled that his dad might have had a Harley back in the day? Weird. It was a lot of fun though and after they finished for the evening, his dad took them to eat hibachi. He…he was glad he got to be home for it.  
  
 _I kept everything inside and even though I tried, it all fell apart. What it meant to me will eventually be a memory of time when I tried so hard, and got so far…but in the end, it doesn’t even matter. I had to fall to lose it all. But in the end, it doesn’t even matter…  
  
_ Shit. “Tell me if this is too dark for you, Shaun” Shin muttered.  
  
“Aww, nii-san, you’re late” Shaun sulked, “Everyone knows this song.”  
  
From a…young standpoint, it probably sounded deep or like a vapid complaint. From where he was now, it just seemed a little too on the nose. He snorted. He was a whopping 20.  
  
“We can call it a night, nii-san. I have to find some more bearings and pinions for the transmission” Shaun sighed, standing.   
  
Oh. Shin nodded slowly, “Well, let me get this buffed some more and I’ll call a quits.”  
  
“Okay! I’ll start dinner.”  
  
Shin smiled after him, continuing to scrape off the fading paint. It…was nice, he hadn’t really thought about getting a hobby to keep his mind off of things. He smirked when his phone rang. Well, aside from this one where he slept with a hot chick from his dad’s old neighborhood every other day.  
  
“Shinnnn” Nesha sang when he answered, “Can I make a proposition?”  
  
“Sure.”  
  
“I don’t want dick today, I just want you to eat my pussy. I’ll let you come on my face as a conciliation.”  
  
Wasaba girls, man. Shin’s brows furrowed, running his hand over the chassis of the eventual motorcycle, “…And how ever would I reach that point, Nesha?”  
  
“ _Fine_ , I’ll suck your dick.”  
  
Smirking again, he dusted off his hands, “I don’t mind either way. I’ll come after I eat dinner.”  
  
Clicking off without much more, he yawned and cleaned his hands in the large sink in the back of the garage. He supposed he’d help Shaun to get things sped up. It wasn’t like he had to cook much, it was usually just the two of them.  
  
He walked into the house from the garage door and was startled to find Tony sitting there in the kitchen, looking pissed. Shaun was browning beef…as most things, Shaun’s cooking went beyond standard. He’d cooked souffles and shepherd’s pie the last few times. Like…rice was fine but he was apparently a master chef somehow.   
  
Shin grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge, blinking drearily back at Tony, “Surprised you’re home. You get lost?”  
  
Tony shot him a hot glare, “Mom and dad turned off my credit card.”  
  
Huh. That was one way to stop the shenanigans. Shaun yawned, grabbing peppers and onions, “So are they gonna turn it back on…?”  
  
“I dunno!” snapped Tony, “This is stupid!”  
  
Not sure he wanted to fight that battle right now, Shin crossed his arms and came to the stove, “…What are you cooking, Shaun?”  
  
“Lasagna. You can fix the garlic bread.”  
  
Fancy. Shin found some bread, slicing it, and started to butter it while Tony tapped his toe impatiently. He wondered what was going on in Tony’s head right now…  
  
Yagami Jill entered, dressed in the black and gray school uniform of Subami High. She looked weary when she walked in but surprised when she saw Tony. “…Hey, Tony.”  
  
“Hi, Jill.”  
  
It was weird, despite also being twins, he didn’t really get that perception of camaraderie that Koji and Nelly had out of these two. Tony was generally _nicer_ to Jill but that bar could still come higher. She sat down across from him, frowning, “What’s going on?”  
  
“Mom and dad turned off my credit cards” he repeated, his face getting more irritated.  
  
“Oh, wow…”  
  
Like they had been preparing for this, both Yagami Dana and Yamada walked into the home. Shin could only stare as Tony leaped to his feet, looking like he was ready to just let loose. Man, spoiled as _hell_. “W-What’s the big idea?! Why did you turn my cards off, huh?! B-Because I’m not going to school?!”  
  
“Hi to you too, dear” Dana said dryly, setting her purse down on the table and approaching Shin to pull him down and kiss his cheek.  
  
Shin smiled at her while his dad kissed the top of Jill’s head. Yamada just looked deadpan at Tony, however, “Son, I’m going to stop you on this tirade fast: we did not shut off your cards.”  
  
“Y-Yea, you did! I can’t use them!” spat Tony.  
  
Dana smirked widely, going into the wine chiller and grabbing a white wine, “Jill?”  
  
The only daughter looked startled by the sudden callout. Hmm? “If you can’t use a card and it hasn’t been turned off, what’s wrong with it?”  
  
Jill looked briefly confused before her blue eyes brightened, “Oh! There’s no money!”  
  
….Ahh. Tony looked flabbergasted. “W-What?”  
  
Yamada accepted a glass from Dana as he wandered to stand next to her near the giant island in the center of the kitchen. Tony was almost gawking, “Bu-But…”  
  
Yep, Tony wanted to ask ‘why?’ but he knew _why_. Dana crossed one arm to hold her elbow, her eyes half-closed, “There are people incapable for reasons beyond their control or help that cannot work or go to school. They should have access to income as they cannot attain it like the rest of us. That, my son, is _not_ your case.”  
  
“We rewarded you for attending school and helping around the house, that was your job. A job is going to be what you do to earn income. As a person not doing a job, you do not earn income” Yamada said bluntly.  
  
Tony looked _livid_. “W-Well, Setsuna’s mom doesn’t work either and her husband still gives her money!!”  
  
Dana glared, “Oh, so when I was at home with you all while your father was at work when you were younger, washing clothes, cooking dinner, cleaning, making beds, bathing you, and helping you with homework, I wasn’t _working_ , huh?”  
  
Oops. Tony gaped, “W-Well, I-I guess that’s—that’s true, bu-but—”  
  
“Look, Tony, your mother and I aren’t the best candidates for understanding what your struggle with this is but we would be setting a poor precedent if we kept feeding your account while you don’t even cook or clean or _show up_ to this house or go to school. You would be getting money to do _nothing_ when you are fully capable of doing _something_ ” Yamada replied.

“You have a room with a comfortable bed, you have entertainment we have gifted you and entertainment you have purchased yourself, and there will never come a day when you’ll have to worry where your next meal is coming from. However, this ‘going to the mall’ or ‘going to the movies and arcade’ or spending this money on a girl? Those are extracurriculars that you no longer can earn from us.”  
  
“So-So that’s it, I’m-I’m gonna look like some kind of loser?!” Tony snapped, flying to his feet.  
  
“Tony…” Jill groaned.  
  
Dana shrugged, “If you’re so worried about maintaining appearances…go get a job.”  
  
It was still odd to Shin, even recollecting this, because at some point all of them had held a job without balking at the idea. They weren’t great jobs, no, but it put a little extra change in their pocket of their own without their parents recommending it. Out of six of them, _only_ Tony looked like the very essence of the universe was being ripped at this idea. “A _job_? W-What the hell?! I don’t-I don’t want to get a job!”  
  
“Then don’t. You’ll just be broke” Dana sighed.  
  
Broke. Tony probably wasn’t even familiar with the mere concept of ‘broke’, even Shin had been a little shaken when he was dealing with it last year and he was just getting a little taste of it. Tony’s face was bright red as he blurted, “I-I hate you guys!”  
  
Oh jeez. He stormed off, apparently leaving the house and slamming the door behind him. Yamada gazed after his retreat before sipping his wine, “…Y’know, I had assumed the first time I got a taste of an ‘I hate you’, it would hurt more. Instead, it just kind of tickles.”  
  
Shin bit his lip as their mother gave their dad a look. Clearing his throat, Shin glanced to Shaun and Jill, “…Does the concept mom and dad laid out make sense to you two?”  
  
It stood to reason they _also_ might have thought it was unfair and would start to mutiny. However, Jill sighed. “…You don’t get free money unless it’s a holiday or your birthday. Shaun and I go to school every day and help around the house while mom spends forty hours on a dress and dad cuts people open to make that money to put in our accounts. It’s, like, the _least_ we can do.”  
  
Yamada sighed gravely, “This is why I wanted more daughters…”  
  
Jill snickered as Dana smacked his arm. Shaun pushed the lasagna into the oven, having spent the conversation composing the layers of noodles and Bolognese sauce, “I mean, that makes sense to me too, dad. Maybe Tony is just dumb.”  
  
“Shaun” scolded Dana lightly.  
  
“I guess Nelly and Tony are the middle children…” Yamada mused, setting his empty cup down.  
  
Oh yea…Nelly wasn’t the same kind of spoiled as Tony by a long shot but he was very clingy and kind of lackadaisical. Like that night they went to Nesha’s party, he didn’t come home until like three in the afternoon that next day. His grades were probably suffering via his mad partying skills but he most likely would get the hint early. Now that other one though…  
  
Shaun served the plates as they all sat. Shin glanced at his watch, finding it was 7…so he should be catching up with Nesha around 8. “I’ll probably be home late tonight, mama, dad.”  
  
His mom ripped the bread, blinking at him, “Oh really? When do we get to meet this young woman you’re running out of here to meet every night?”  
  
‘Meet’? “O-Oh, well, it’s…uh, it’s…not that…serious, mom. We’re just…friends.”  
  
Yea, the friend he stayed over at sometimes and came home still covered with hickeys depending on if they got drunk. Dana sighed, “…I told you you’d be cursed, didn’t I, Yama?”  
  
The blond man sulked. What?? The man grumbled, “…Do we know this friend?”  
  
Meep. “U-Um, Nesha Johansson.”  
  
His dad looked shocked, pausing with his fork hovering, “…Roller’s daughter?”  
  
“What kind of name is ‘Roller’?” Shaun questioned, wiping his hands.  
  
“Why is Roller’s daughter’s name ‘Johansson’?” Dana asked, also seeming puzzled.  
  
“Wasaba had…weird names going around, Shaun. And, uh, reasons, Dana…” Yamada droned.  
  
‘Reasons’. Shin’s eyes narrowed, eating a bit of the noodle, “She told me that her dad found out about her after he got married and didn’t want anything to do with her so he just paid her mom child support to keep them from telling his wife.”  
  
Yamada flinched and Dana gawked, “Yama! Is that true?”  
  
“It’s…it’s not _that_ uncommon in Wasaba, dear” their dad said slowly.  
  
Their mom glared full double sided _axes_ at their dad, “Oh _really_? So do _you_ have a son or daughter I don’t know about that you’re paying hush money to and pretending doesn’t exist?”  
  
“No, _Dana_ , I do _not_ have a secret child that I am paying off to keep secret” he countered drably, “I said it wasn’t _uncommon,_ not that we _all_ have the same thing going on.”  
  
Dana scoffed, “Well, I still wouldn’t be _surprised_ …”  
  
“Given my history with my parentage, I will forever _pray_ that is not the case. I’m too old to live with that now.”  
  
What now? Dana patted his hand, nodding, “You’re a regionally well-known doctor, I’m sure if you had any miscellaneous kids, they would have popped up by now.”  
  
Unfortunately, given his extra time in Wasaba lately, Shin couldn’t say over a dozen women were misconstruing his father. It sounded like he was _well_ acquainted with a good amount of women. He still heard about these…lingual skills and it made him sick every time.  
  
“I’m still going to have a good talking to to Roller” Dana sulked, “Of all things.”  
  
“Dana, this young woman is Shin’s age, it’s kind of…late to force Roller’s fatherhood onto her” Yamada explained.  
  
She suddenly looked puzzled before they started…quirking. He wasn’t sure of a better way to say it, it was just when all verbal communication shut down and they were suddenly able to have a conversation through looks. It was honestly kind of scary. Shin smiled as the kids appeared mystified as well. “So, uh, Jill, how was school, imoto?”  
  
“Huh? Oh, uh, it was school, nii-san” she replied, poking at her lasagna absently.  
  
“Is the lasagna not good, nee-san?” Shaun questioned.  
  
“Oh no, it’s delicious, Shaun! I’m just kind of tired.”  
  
Shin raised a brow at her. She had seemed _very_ tired lately but it didn’t seem quite like it was all school related somehow. Looked like she _also_ had something on her mind.  
  
…He guessed he’d get to the bottom of it tomorrow after she got some rest. Wiping his mouth, he took the dishes and started to wash them. The kids excused themselves to their own entertainment while his parents moved to the living room to whisper about…Nesha’s parentage? Weird.  
  
Shin took a shower and slipped out into the night, making the now weathered journey to Wasaba. Nelly joked that he was pretty whipped right now. Maybe a tiny bit. And since he never saw her with other men, he never got particularly jealous but he was sure if he did, it’d be like Naomi…  
  
She opened the door before he was able to even knock, tugging him in and pulling him roughly against her. For someone almost six inches shorter than him, she sure knew how to throw him around. He actually kind of liked it though.  
  
“I’ve been waiting for you.”  
  
“I can tell.”  
  
Today she was wearing a slinky white tank top dress, her long hair pulled back in a ponytail. Kissing him, she started to unbutton his shirt. She breathed, “No fucking.”  
  
Shin grasped her ass, pulling her flush against him, “…I’m disappointed but I can deal.”  
  
Nesha wrapped her arms around his neck, rolling her eyes, “…MAYBE I’ll let you hit it if you make a convincing…case for yourself.”  
  
He pulled up the back of her dress, running his hand down the curve of her bottom. She had on a white, lacy sheer thong today…Nesha yelped when he slapped her ass hard. He smiled smugly as she leered at him. “Keep it up, Pretty Boy, and I won’t even suck your dick.”  
  
Smacking the other cheek again before hefting her up to carry to her bedroom, he drawled, “Now, now, you said you’d let me plead my case.”  
  
She was gnawing her lip as he relaxed her on the bed, spreading her legs without preamble. He kissed her inner thigh, rubbing the other. He chuckled when she almost smothered his face into her crotch. “I don’t need foreplay, fucker, I’m already horny.”

“So demanding” he joked, sitting up and grabbing the lacy stringed edges of her thong.  
  
Parting her thick lips, he teasingly thumbed her clit before dipping back down. Her legs trembled as he flicked his tongue slowly against her naked clit before curling it around the nub.   
  
“Mm, fuck, Shin” she rasped, running her fingers through his hair as he suckled her folds.  
  
Man, he hoped she let him, he was getting hard. Plus, there was a little…perk he wanted to try if she was so willing.  
  
Nesha’s back arched, breathily exhaling a faint ‘fuck’ as he fingered deep, keeping his mouth busy while he searched out…  
  
“Fuck, fuck, fuck” she sobbed, her lower body bucking off the bed as he pulled away to massage her.  
  
When she writhed, he knew she was close, managing to angle her and his body to allow him to keep licking her clit and maintaining the right type of stroke on the deep sensitive spot. He licked his lips, that sound of his fingers inside her wet pussy exciting him more.  
  
“A-Ah, fuck, Shin, stop” Nesha choked, her legs shaking hard as her sex contracted hard.  
  
Doing as told, he did gently stroke her as she recovered, her eyes half closed as she breathed lightly, “You know, you’re a jerk.”  
  
“Good jerk or bad jerk?”  
  
“Ass” she snorted before turning over on her stomach, the forementioned part in the air, “I don’t feel like washing cum out of my hair anyway.”  
  
Shin smirked, unzipping his pants, “Well…remember that thing we were discussing?”  
  
“…Yea?”  
  
“I got one. It’s green. Matches your eyes.”  
  
Nesha’s face scrunched before she grumbled, turning so her chin was down, “…If I don’t like it, take it out. That’s apparently more up _Odette’s_ new alley.”  
  
“Of course.”  
  
Grabbing the slick lubricant from off her nightstand, he poured it down the crease of her ass, fingering the opening before pulling out the metal ‘plug’ with a green jewel from his pocket. Nesha made a little squeak as he attempted to ease it in. “Mm, relax, Nesha…”  
  
“Ugh…” she grumbled.  
  
She must have complied as he slipped the toy into her. While he hadn’t convinced her to try…anal, maybe this will get her curious. Nesha moaned softly, “Fuck…j-just stick it inside.”  
  
He…tried to comply but he guessed that was a _potential_ ‘perk’ of the plug, she managed to feel even tighter than usual. He actually jerked back out, a little startled by the sensation. “Fuck, Nesha…”  
  
That damn Nesha though, she looked back at him with the most mischievous expression. “Oh ho ho, am I about to get you to come before me for once?”  
  
“N-No, wait” he blurted as she sat up, pushing him to lie on his back.  
  
Oh man, _maybe_ , he thought, his eyes rolling back as she sat backwards, slipping his cock inside of her. Fuck, it felt so good. She rode him seamlessly, her round ass slapping against his pelvis. Moaning a bit himself, he really…tried. Like, he usually could manage to not orgasm first, but he felt himself ejaculate as she continued to ride him. “Oh shit…” he breathed.  
  
Nesha giggled sultrily, wiggling a bit right on his cock, “Wow, I think your little plug was worth it.”  
  
Oh, hell. “I’m very protective when it comes to my records, Nesha” he purred.  
  
Her laugh turned into little delighted chirps as he redirected them back to the previous position on their knees, thrusting his shaft deep inside of her. “Yes, yes, just like that” she mumbled, apparently satisfied with his deep push and pace.  
  
Shin was able to regain his place of making sure she finished first, albeit it was tough given she still was very…cozy and warm down there. He lied down as she sleepily lied beside him, looking satisfied. “I’m already jealous of your future wife.”  
  
“Yea, what future wife?” he snorted.  
  
She sat up on her side on her elbow, her eyes half-shut as she gazed at him, “You’ll have a wife, dummy. And she’s going to like you and she’s going to get to have orgasms all the time.”  
  
“The bar is not high there” he couldn’t help laugh.  
  
“Dude, I’ve been fucking since I was fourteen and since I’ve known you, I’ve had more orgasms this month than those six years. It is a _rarity_ , at least in these parts.”  
  
While he was still glad they were both on the same page of where this was going, he did blink, flirting, “And you’re sure you don’t want to keep me for yourself?”  
  
Nesha smirked, rolling her eyes, “You’re funny. Do I seem like the type you bring home to mommy?”  
  
“Well now, that’s not a fair assessment” Shin pouted, “I would take you home to my parents if we had that sort of relationship. The only reason I don’t consider an ‘us’ is I’m about to be spirited off to possibly die and you probably have more important stuff going on.”  
  
She sighed, stroking a loose tendril of hair out of his face, “We’re not lovey dovey or any crap, Yagami, but I honestly don’t want you to die.”  
  
“Thanks” he snickered.  
  
“I’m serious! …Though I mean, that didn’t come out with any ounce of affection so I can see why it was funny” she laughed as well, “Wasaba language for you, my guy.”  
  
Shin smiled some, sitting up against the pillow. “Can I ask you something?”  
  
“Depends.”  
  
“Well…I have a younger sister, right? I have a creeping suspicion but she’s seemed out of sorts lately. She’s very tired but doesn’t seem like it’s physical. It’s almost seeming…mental. She’s usually not so down and I’m thinking she’s not going to tell me what’s going on.”  
  
Nesha snorted, “Shin, you already know that answer.”  
  
“Damn it” he mumbled, running his hands down his face.  
  
A boy. He had to go find a boy and murder him. Grimly, he shook his head. Well…he didn’t care for killing but there was still room in his heart for killing those that hurt his baby sister. Nesha yawned, “Wish I had had a big bad ‘onii-san’ to chase all the bad boys away.”  
  
“I doubt he’d like me very much then” Shin sighed.  
  
“If you knew the boys I fuck and have fucked around with, you’d know my mythical onii-san would think I’m on the right track with a boy like you” she shrugged, “Your dad continues to be an enigma in these parts, a lot of people simply do not get out of here and do…that much better.”  
  
Shin frowned, having to wonder…was she plotting on staying here too?  
  
“It’s too early to be done, by the way, this is just a timeout” Nesha informed him, reaching down and stroking his cock.  
  
…It…it didn’t matter in terms of their relationship. In the end, this…probably didn’t matter. A future wife? That…that also seemed unlikely.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _“Let’s see if it works!!”  
  
Shin stood outside with his dad, Shaun, Koji, and Nelly, all of them silently regarding this…contraption and the youngest Yagami as he sat on…the bike.  
  
It was May. He left next month and he was absolutely…dismayed. This wasn’t even near enough time. In fact, he really almost wished they had just run through the rest of the tenure because now he was almost ready to go MIA. Sure, basic with Joe had been fun but they weren’t out there killing people. If drill was all the army meant, he’d be in great shape. Instead…  
  
All the same, he just kind of plugged along, helping Shaun with his motorcycle, and failing to get out of Jill who was bothering her. She assured him she was just tired with school and he had no real…reason to doubt her. It just seemed questionable. Kind of like his relationship with her twin. _

_Tony had remained offended by their parent’s rather reasonable decree that all the elective stuff he did did not require their funding. Shin had offered to help him find a job, if it would help, but the punk just bit his head off and CHEWED. He…he just let it go, he wasn’t going to force anything if the other party didn’t want to. A sad hopefully not conclusion for a sibling but Shin was barely stable enough as was.  
  
As was his faith in this thing they built. Shin’s brows raised as Shaun eagerly started to turn the key. It…looked amazing, like, the color scheme Shaun came up with of the glitter navy blue and black and white accents, it was gorgeous. Just…_

_  
Their dad, when he could, reviewed all the schematics Shaun was using and he…reluctantly agreed that it all appeared to be correct. Just the fact of the matter was, they were in no way trained engineers qualified to make a damn motorcycle.  
  
As agreed upon, they were going to get it inspected by a professional. However, there was a very…ambivalent agreement that they needed to see if it started first. Shaun was the only one excited. Koji turned and muttered to him, “…What percent chance do we have that this thing blows up?”  
  
“…Uh…maybe…thirty percent?” Shin estimated.  
  
“Hot damn.”  
  
Shaun pouted at them as Nelly backed up, “It will NOT explode!”  
  
“Yea…let…me start it up, son” Yamada groaned, saying lightly under his breath ‘your mom will kill me if I let you get hurt’.  
  
Koji made a face, “…We need you to have arms to continue supporting our family, dad.”  
  
Shin smirked as Shaun looked crushed. “Shaun, we’re messing with you, kid. We don’t think it’ll blow up, it’s just…suspicious that we would have somehow created a running vehicle.”  
  
“But I think we did!” Shaun said, his eyes aglow.  
  
Their dad sat on the bike, sticking the key in the ignition. They all held their breath as the man turned it over…  
  
…And it choked. Shaun gaped, “Oh no! What’s wrong with it?”  
  
The youngest ran over to it as Koji frowned, getting closer to observe the machine. “…Did you get a new fuel pump or find one?”  
  
Yamada’s eyes briefly widened, nodding, “We were having trouble finding an adequate fuel pump. We just assumed the one we got would work with the injectors.”  
  
“Well, shit, if that’s all that’s wrong with it, let’s go find one” Nelly replied.  
  
With a smile, Shin wandered behind the now more enthused group, wishing for the life of him that his journey didn’t require leaving them behind. He…  
  
…He wanted to stay. Most of all…he wanted to stay alive.  
  
_“Sweetie Plum?”  
  
“Hey, mama” Shin greeted as he walked toward the bus station which was about to take him away to his last drill before he returned to Iraq.  
  
It was a warm, muggy day, and, competing with Joe or _not,_ he was not looking forward to being outside running obstacles today. Alas, he was about to go back to 45 Celsius, 112 degree days regardless so may as well get used to it.  
  
About to head to sit in the station for the couple of hours before the bus departed, his mother gave him a call. She sounded a little worried. “I understand if you can’t, dear, but do you have enough time to check in on Koji? He had a fever the last few days and now I can’t get him on the phone.”  
  
Figures. Shin looked at his phone. It was only about fifteen minutes away so he had _some_ time. “I can, mama. I’ll call you when I figure out where he is.”  
  
“Thank you! And tell him to pick up his damn phone if he’s just goofing off.”  
  
He snickered, heading back toward the university. “Will do, mama.”  
  
Making his way to the dorm, he received some stares as usual because of his camo garb. That, or it was weird he was allowed to walk in here in the first place, what kind of security was this? Coming to Koji’s door, he knocked a few times. Standing there for five minutes though, he was confused to receive no answer.  
  
Oh damn, he forgot, Koji said he, Keiba, and Domon had asked for a room with a separate bed and desk for all of them instead of the bunk bed situation. Recalling possibly a…four, he decided to call Koji to clarify. No answer. C’mon. _“Koji, I have to go to drill soon. Where are you?” Shin muttered to himself._ _  
  
_‘Find the number fourteen’ kept ringing in his head so, he knocked, prepared to apologize if he was wrong. _He was startled to find the movement opened the door a bit, apparently the barrier having been left ajar. He was briefly concerned Koji might be unconscious on the other side…_ _  
  
_ _Instead, however, was a young blonde woman sitting on a bed, wearing the shortest pair of jeans he’d ever seen and that was considering Nesha completely and a white tank top. To top it all off, she…very clearly was reading what appeared to be a porn magazine, two naked women on the front. Um…oops. About to apologize for his intrusion, he noted the picture of ‘Shaun’s soul’ over one of the desks and got confused._

_“Uh, I'm...I'm sorry, is this Yagami Koji's dorm?” he decided to ask._ _  
  
_ _Whomever this woman was looked up, startled. She had almost crystal blue eyes. Apparently that hourglass shape was becoming more acceptable to their generally biased society because she had it completely. She gasped, “Oh my Gawd, you're so hawt!”_ _  
  
_ _What now?? Shin smiled nervously, shy, “...U-uh, t-thanks? But uh, is...is my brother here? My mom wanted me to check on him.”_ _  
  
_ _“Ooh, Koji has SUCH a sexy family” she gasped, standing up and setting the magazine aside, “He went out but you can wait for him here.”_ _  
  
_ _Who…even was this? No occupants of the room were even here! “O-oh, uh...”_ _  
  
_ _This mystery stranger who he had no doubt Koji was banging had him sit on the couch, sitting beside him. He…God, he was on some serious whore shit lately, but he just could not_ _not_ _notice her breasts. They were just so…_ _bountiful.  
  
_ _Like she just_ _knew_ _he was in slut mode right now, one reason being he just ogled her chest for a solid ten seconds, she suddenly started to nibble her lip, running her hand up his chest. Woah now. “Ooh, a guy in a uniform is so fucking sexy.”_ _  
  
_ _May_ _damn_ _DAY. Shin opened his mouth to…say what? What do you say to such bluntness? Thanks again? He lost all words as she sat up on her knees and started to rub his shoulders. What the hell was this?? “You feel tense...how 'bout I help?”_ _  
  
_ _Her chest was braced against his back and his mind was slipping like Jello. What was even her_ _name?_ _She didn’t even know_ _his name_ _? Who_ _starts_ _with a proposition?! “O-o-oh, I can't, I...”_ _  
  
_ _…But…well, he…was going to be…leaving the whole country pretty soon, so…_

_No! No, you don’t know who this is or even who this is to Koji! For once on this journey home, stop thinking with your penis, Shin!  
  
…Well…just…_

_...Well, maybe he...could?_ _  
  
_“U-Um…sure?” Literally, how do you accept a sexual advance that occurred about four lines into the first conversation?  
  
The still unknown woman clapped her hands together before pushing him to rest his back against the arm of the chair. He was really just in disbelief this was happening as she unzipped his pants. She looked amazed. “Ooh, a special edition?”  
  
Huh? “…O-Oh, you mean the-the uncircumcised deal.”  
  
“Don’t worry, I can get the same reaction out of both” she assured, leaning over.  
  
Shin stared as she kissed the head, her tongue turning a slow circle around the circumference as she stroked the length. No, this…this was nuts, he needed to stop this…  
  
His mind almost _blacked out_ when her mouth sank over the entirety of his dick.   
  
Covering his mouth, flustering, as she at ease bobbed her head up and down, he was… _floored_. She wasn’t even _gagging_ , anyone that had tried to deepthroat him in the past at THIS angle would have gagged and given up by now.   
  
_Fuck,_ he wasn’t going to make it, he thought frantically as she continued without abandon or care. Moaning, he choked out, “S-Stop, wait.”  
  
She pulled off of his rock hard cock, wiping her lips and looking at him questionably. Before he could state…something, her eyes suddenly traveled to his erection and she gasped, “You’re _right_ , I do want to ride it.”  
  
 _What now_? Gaping as she took off her shorts but not before grabbing a condom from the pocket, apparently not wearing underwear, Shin yelped as she dangled the contraceptive in her teeth. Well, at…at least she…she was being safe, whoever…whoever she was.  
  
Ripping it open, she rolled it out onto his dick and just…eased it inside of her. She was already very wet apparently, he was not getting an ounce of friction. Just dumbfounded as _hell,_ Shin trembled as she essentially…fucked _him_. The roll of her hips was _seamless._ There was no slip, no broken pace, no loss of measure, it was like she was a machine on a timer with each thrust. No, just the occasional downward pound completely penetrating her pussy. She moaned contently. “Oh, you’re so big…”  
  
He had absolutely nothing to contribute out of the fact that if he lost a centimeter of concentration right now, he was going to come immediately. The mystery woman giggled, breathy, “And you all have such high stamina, I love it.”  
  
‘All’? About to stammer out in question of what that meant, his eyes shut as he did ejaculate, cursing himself. Well, there was no shame here, he was _not_ prepared for this level of expertise in this area, good grief. Thankfully though, she wasn’t very much further behind him, her legs shuddering as her sex contracted, pulsing over his shaft.   
  
…What in the hell?? What was her _name_?!

Before he could fully grasp that he just had the _pinnacle_ of stranger sex and essentially a _stranger sex QUICKIE,_ the door to the dorm opened.  
  
This was a dorm. And not his dorm nor just Koji’s dorm, other unrelated people lived here. Almost screaming, he quickly managed to wrangle his penis back into his pants while the blonde seemed nonplussed. Just… ‘luckily’, maybe? Well, _luckily_ , it was Koji. His younger brother paused at the door, staring in quietly before his face registered confusion. Oh, hell, what if this was his new girlfriend?! Damn it, Shin!  
  
“…Julia, what the hell?”  
  
Julia. She…now had a name. _Julia_ laughed as she grabbed her shorts off the floor, “Just you wait, Koji, I’m going to get through the whole collection.”  
  
…Collection? Koji just blinked languidly, “…Do whatever, just leave my sister the hell alone and get outta here.”  
  
What now?! Julia seemed unbothered, pulling on her pants and humming, “It was _fun_ , Shin, I wish it could have gone a bit longer without _interruption_! Take care now!”  
  
So wait…she knew _his_ name?? She skipped out like…she hadn’t just had sex and Koji closed the door before drawling, “…You’ve really kind of gone off the deep end, haven’t you, oldest?”  
  
“Yes” Shin sobbed, covering his face.  
  
“Well, I am convinced Julia was a succubus in her last life” Koji snorted.  
  
Shin leered, going to the tiny closet sized bathroom in the corner to…compose himself. “This never would have happened if you had just picked up your stupid phone!”  
  
“Excuse _you,_ buddy, but my battery stopped working so I actually was just out getting another one” Koji snorted, “I even talked to your ‘commander’ on the way back and told her I’m _fine_. She probably called you too but you were too busy getting your brain fucked out.”  
  
Damn it! Shin checked his phone and there was indeed a missed call about ten minutes ago from their mom. “…Yea, well, it was too late by then anyway.”  
  
“Impeccable stroke game, right?” Koji said randomly.  
  
“Otherworldly, you mean” Shin droned.  
  
Exiting the bathroom, Shin stuffed his hands in his pockets, finding Koji on the other side flipping the couch cushion. Yea…that was gross too. “…Sorry. I hope she wasn’t your girlfriend or potential or something.”  
  
“Tuh, don’t make me laugh” Koji snickered, “Julia would _never_ , first off, and second off, _I_ would never. We are the _friendliest_ of benefits.”  
  
Of course… “You really don’t think you’ll settle down, huh?”  
  
“Not with girls like Julia.”  
  
“Oh, you mean the female version of you?” Shin found himself countering sarcastically.  
  
Koji snorted, sitting at his desk, “I’m not a hypocrite, _sergeant_. She’s polyamorous to the boot, meaning she would want to have an open relationship even if we were committed. I might sleep around right now but when I say you’re my girlfriend and you call me your man, I’m keeping it monogamous. That works for her but it’s not my jam.”  
  
Oh yea…glancing at his watch, he grimaced. “Well, I gotta go before I miss the bus…for the love of _God,_ don’t let your phone die again.”  
  
“Will do” snickered Koji, grabbing his keys back up, “I’ll walk with you. Gonna miss these ‘brotherly chats’.”  
  
…Right. They strode alongside each other up the roads, Shin gazing up at the sky. “…I know it’s hard with college, Koji, but try to watch things at home. I…I want Shaun to stay on the straight and arrow, he’ll do well in life. And Jill…”  
  
Koji would run to the mansion _right now_ if Shin told him Jill appeared to have ‘boy problems’. He shrugged instead, “She’s the one that has to be good out of that combination because Tony is not good right now. I don’t want her to get stressed.”  
  
The man nodded, his hands stuffed in his pockets, “Will do. And you? Don’t crack.”  
  
“I will give it my best go…”  
  
“I hope the Zechs would have gotten tired of this shenanigans by the time you go back and are ready to throw in the towel” Koji murmured, “…Just sick.”  
  
Oh damn, right! “You just reminded me, Koji: that guy…that guy we saw in the restaurant before I left-- Louis? I think he goes to your school, is there any way you could find him for me?”  
  
Koji looked bewildered. “…Well, I can ask around, yea. Why…?”  
  
…At least…one remaining asset came out of that lie. He…really didn’t have a lot to show for anything right now, sleeping senselessly with anyone slightly interested, but…whatever.  
  
….Just…just a few more weeks.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _“…That is the most illogical thing I have ever heard.”  
  
Yagami Shin had convinced Akiyama Jyou to return to Saitama University with him after drill. Koji had called and informed him he ‘found the guy’ and advised where Shin could get in contact. With the promise of a college party, Joe grudgingly came with him.  
  
Now, they were standing in a private room with anime posters and various plants all over the place along with stacks upon stacks of notebooks. Joe stood with his arms crossed, looking aggravated. “…Who is this guy, Shin?”  
  
Torataro Louis was staring back at them weirdly as Shin relayed the information that the Zechs were supposedly going to be floating submarines to a southern island. Describing the distance and the plot, Louis also seemed in disbelief. Shin tipped his head toward Louis, nodding, “Louis gave me a different perspective on the Zechs’ plans. From what I saw overseas, it entirely made more sense so I thought maybe he could shine some light on your situation so you don’t go in in the dark.”  
  
“Well, you’d have to give me some time on this one, Yagami-san, I’m with you” Louis snorted, sitting in a rolling desk chair, “Crossing thousands and thousands of miles of desert to then go thousands of miles to an island? There would have to be a better way.”  
  
Joe blinked languidly as Shin mused. Well…a little group discussion never hurt anyone.  
  
“What’s up, Baby Daddy-y-y?”  
  
“Good, your girlfriend isn’t around” Shin said dryly, Joe and Louis’ eyes wide as he had Yamada Komari on speaker, “You got time to be on my think tank?”  
  
Komari snorted, “Buddy, we’re going to be back in the desert pretty soon, so-o-o-o…”  
  
“Just a few minutes” he requested, “I have my old buddy from Wasaba, Akiyama Joe, and the guy that came up with the capitalist idea, Torataro Louis. Joe is getting transferred from the Army to the Marines.”  
  
“Oh dude, we must be in some deep shit then” Komari whistled.  
  
“Joe, Louis, this is my roommate and comrade, Yamada Komari” Shin introduced.  
  
Joe gave him a look and Louis looked very confused. Oh yea, Komari was a woman. “She made a…special request. Anyway, Komari, Joe got transferred because, per intelligence, the Zechs are going to start sending Terran captives through Yemen and are going to take submarines to an island between Africa and Australia.”  
  
“So…they’re going to spend about two months crossing the desert in almost 120 degree temperatures with a group of people they want to keep alive…to then take them underwater…to get to mysterious island” Komari drawled.  
  
“Yep.”  
  
“Yea, you sure they told you right, bro?”  
  
Joe leered, “Yes! That is my mission briefing. The Zechs are calling it the ‘Aquana’ plan.”  
  
Komari sounded like she was drinking something before she rasped, “Well…it’s a shit plan.”  
  
“It just can’t BE their plan!” Louis proclaimed, throwing his hands up, “It’s-it’s just TOO stupid! It’s like setting fire to a house to roast a marshmallow stupid!”  
  
With a sigh, Joe gave him an exasperated look. Shin, however, felt…nauseous. Wait. “…What if that’s not the plan? What if…what if Terran are already there?”  
  
Joe raised a brow, “…Ya’ll are already saying it’s stupid to get them there like this but wouldn’t it be just as crazy for them to already be there?”  
  
Louis spun around in his chair, typing, “Well, actually, there were some Terrans that relocated to an island…they called it Fenith. I wouldn’t say it’s EXACTLY between Africa and Australia but I suppose it’s close enough.”  
  
Fenith? Komari replied, “I had heard about that but I figured they were safe by distance.”  
  
Frowning, Joe sat down on a chair, “…So maybe it’s not that they’re BRINGING Terrans there. It’s that they’re going to go try to attack the island.”  
  
Louis scowled, “That’s kind of a large disparity and, not to force feelings upon you, Akiyama-san, but I’d feel a little irritated if I was under the impression I was just supposed to stop the Zechs in the water versus stopping them from attacking a village.”_

_  
“Seriously!” Joe sulked, “If that is true, we’d be protecting people!”  
  
“…You know, I bet they were targeting the wrong Terrans.”  
  
They all looked, startled, as Komari said this. “…What?” Shin questioned slowly.  
  
“Think about it: they want these secret runes or whatever that help plant life or whatever. We’re in the middle of the fucking desert, dude! How many gardens did you see in the town we watched?”  
  
… “…None.”  
  
“So what would make them equipped with that knowledge? They don’t know anything.”  
  
…Wait. Louis’s eyes widened and Joe looked…startled. “…I mean, fuck, right: they might be able to grow SOMETHIN’ but they probably don’t even have the info those bastards are looking for. That’s fucked up.”  
  
Shin swallowed. “…No. They probably…do have the information they’re looking for.”  
  
Louis’s eyes narrowed, “…They probably know where Fenith Island is. It may not be that they were trying to get the information on how to get the technology from them…”  
  
“They were trying to find out where the island is” Joe muttered, “So one of the Terrans broke.”  
  
“Well, I figured that with the shit Shin and I saw in Sharance. It would take a HELL of a person not to break after that sort of torture” Komari scoffed.  
  
Grimacing, Shin nodded. “…So Joe, they…they probably told you that to keep the mission prompt classified but it’s most likely you’re going to be defending Fenith Island from the Zechs.”  
  
“There are still some things not adding up here…” Louis mumbled.  
  
“Yea, he’s right” Komari said, “One, if this is some secret island, how does anyone reap the benefits of these runes? They can’t just export them if no one knows where they are.”  
  
Joe rubbed his chin, “…Something has to be in the desert. The one thing the reports had circled was ‘desert’.”  
  
Louis was typing, nodding, “…I’ll try to come up with something before you’re sent back, Yagami-san. I wish you had contacted me sooner. Did Lyla not tell you I went to school here?”  
  
He tried not to get too battered by hearing that name but it caused that storm in his soul that just never seemed to break. “…We’re not on speaking terms anymore so I’d prefer you not mention her.”  
  
Both Joe and Louis looked up, baffled. Komari yawned, “Well, if you guys don’t come up with anything soon, I’m sure the three of us will know pretty quick how fucked up this nightmare is going to be. I gotta go though, my old lady might be coming back.”  
  
“All right, Yamada. See you soon” Shin murmured.  
  
Clicking the red phone, ‘end’, Shin bowed, “Thank you for your insight, Louis. I know you’re busy so if you don’t come up with anything, I understand.”  
  
“No, no, I’ll be thinking on it all night” he assured before giving Shin a soft expression.  
  
…Luckily he didn’t say anything, walking them to the door after Shin left his number. As they walked the city streets back to the dorm party Koji assured Shin he was going to have, Joe cleared his throat, “…It’s okay if you fight me but I GOTTA ask: what happened between you and Lyla?”  
  
Shin inhaled sharply, balling his fists, “…It’s no concern, Jyou.”  
  
“So I could sleep with her now then?”  
  
“Do whatever the hell you want.”  
  
Joe shot him a bland face, “…Was it because she yelled at you for knocking boots with your roommate?”  
  
“What the fuck? No” Shin glared, reaching to get his cigarettes from his pocket.  
  
“I dunno, man, having a chick call you ‘baby daddy’ can seriously wreck a relationship…”  
  
While Shin wanted to be mad, it was kind of funny. “Man, you’re about as off as that Zechs plan is, jeez.”  
  
Lighting up, he shrugged softly, “…I gave her a promise ring before I left. She left it on my bed and I stupidly went looking for her. I ran into her dad and he basically told me I’m too lowly for his daughter and disrespected my entire family. She was there for enough of it and didn’t say anything. Actions speak louder than words and that act beat into me that I was an idiot for ever being…anything with her.”  
  
“…Dunno, Shin. It’d piss me off too, I get you, just…like you’re saying with why I’m being transferred, something is just really missing there, man” Joe insisted.  
  
…Then so be it. Like the Zechs’ reasoning, her reasoning was probably ‘stupid’ too. _

_…So be it.  
  
_ XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
Well, this was a nightmare.  
  
Shin was almost petrified as he rode ‘Kamex’, the name Shaun gave to his self-built, _working_ , motorcycle. It took a bit of rigging but the Yagami men got the fuel pump working and some other belts and, finally, the bike came to life. They’d all been stunned. It _worked_.  
  
Before Shaun could start riding it, Shin insisted he’d take it for inspection first. Yea, they got it running but that didn’t mean it was _safe_. So he rode it to a mechanic and had them look it over. The guy was very thorough, using computers and tapping stuff with his hammer while observing the inner workings. To Shin’s horror, the guy said everything looked ‘good’. _What though_?  
  
So now, with the passing grade of a mechanic, he was driving this thing back to hand over the reigns to its rightful master. God, don’t let that kid break his neck on this thing…  
  
Zipping back into the yard, he was puzzled to find only Koji and Nelly outside. Shaun had been busting at the seams to see his creation get ordained, where was he? Pulling up near the twins, he made a face, “…It’s good.”  
  
“Figured that” Koji droned, shaking his head, “…The kid made a running motorcycle.”  
  
Nelly’s brows quirked, “…Well, good for him. I’m sure he’s glad to have something commemorative for you and dad working with him.”  
  
…Yea. Shin smiled and looked around, “Where is he?”  
  
“Oh, he wanted to draw something, surprisingly” Koji frowned.  
  
“Hopefully no more potatoes…” Nelly droned.   
  
They snickered and Koji reached into his pocket, pulling out his traditional black cigarettes, and stuck one in his mouth. Just as Shin was about to do the same, a gray car suddenly came up the long driveway and pulled up right in front of them. Hmm? Who was this?  
  
“Aww, shit” Koji muttered under his breath.  
  
What?? Three rather bulky looking guys got out of the car and Shin quickly looked to Nelly and Koji who appeared dismayed. What?? Those two sometimes fought as a hobby, were _they_ scared?! The oldest appearing one came to a stop a few feet away, his face stony. “…Is Tony here?”  
  
Aww, shit. Koji scratched his cheek, “…Yea, he is.”  
  
“Call him out.”  
  
Nelly slowly walked to the front door and called from the foyer. Shin walked closer to Koji and turned, muttering, “…Please tell me these aren’t her brothers.”  
  
“Bingo.”  
  
Damn it! Pinching the bridge of his nose, he was at a _total_ loss when Tony came down the steps, looking pissed since that was his default right now…before absolute _horror_ stretched across his face. “Oh shit.”  
  
“So you thought you were going to two time our sister, huh?” spat one of the brothers, coming forward with a crowbar in hand.  
  
Shit, shit, shit. Tony blanched, shaking his head rapidly, “I-It wasn’t even like that!”  
  
“Oh, so you’re calling Taiko a liar, huh?!” snapped one of the others.  
  
While _anyone else_ with an _ounce_ of sense knew they’d dug themselves a hole, he was pretty sure the trio of older brothers had an insular ‘where in the hell did we go wrong?’ moment when Tony countered back, “Maybe she is!”  
  
“Oh-Okay, okay” Koji actually blurted, quickly holding up his hands.

The fact of the matter was, under probably zero circumstances would Koji have been on this end of any argument. It was a little different communicating in a fight you both didn’t start and wanted no part in. Now, in another plot twist, _he_ was about to play peacemaker, “Look, we are all the older brothers of this family and, let me tell you, I’ve been in a shit load of fights over our only baby sister so I a million percent get where you’re coming from.”  
  
“Oh yea?” snorted the oldest, “So you’ll let us beat your little brother’s ass, huh?”  
  
“He really-y-y-y needs an ass whooping, I can tell you that, but I know I couldn’t stand here and watch it happen” Koji relented.  
  
Oh God. The guy stepped right up to fucking _Yagami Koji’s_ face and snarled, “Then _leave_.”  
  
“Didn’t say _I_ was above kicking your ass either, _buddy_ , so I recommend you relocate my personal bubble while I’m in mild spirits.”  
  
“Please, he’s insane” Nelly actually pleaded.  
  
Shin also held up his hands in a sign of…hopefully good faith, “Look, if we swear to you that Tony will cut all contact with Taiko and stay away from her, can we forego this…punishment? As Koji said, we are incredibly sympathetic to you wanting to protect your sister. We would definitely be doing the same thing as you. Just…can we call it even this once?”  
  
The three brothers of Taiko looked at each other before the eldest representative drawled, “On some conditions.”  
  
Oh boy. “O-Okay.”  
  
“He needs to come clean to _Setsuna_ too that he was two-timing _her_ with Taiko.”  
  
Tony gawked, “N-No way!”  
  
“ _Done_ ” Koji amended.  
  
“We also want him, before he leaves our sister the hell alone, to apologize to her for hurting her feelings. She really liked this bastard” the man grunted.  
  
Incredibly reasonable. Tony was shivering though before he turned bright red, “Fuck you! I won’t apologize for shit!”  
  
Shin scratched the back of his neck as Koji simply smoked his cigarette, staring absently into the sky while Nelly smiled grimly. Honestly, would it be wrong if they joined Taiko’s brothers…?  
  
At some point a crowbar was swung. Shin managed to hook the guy’s arm and bring his knee up into his stomach. _Damn it_. Koji ducked a punch before shoving the guy into a neck lock…then kneeing him _hard_ in the gut. The man groaned in agony as Koji quickly released him, looking alarmed, “Fuck, how do you fight when there’s no animosity on your end?!”  
  
“Like _this_ ” Shin snapped.  
  
Koji was fucking right, they had about as much reason to fight these guys as someone they passed on the street or something, this was _ridiculous_! So, surprising generally everyone, he snatched Tony, who had _recoiled_ despite this being his fight, up by the back of his shirt and shoved him right in front of the fray. “He’s _yours_.”  
  
“Woah, Shin, hey…” Nelly said slowly.  
  
“Fuck it, Nerimaru! He wants to act like he’s so big and bad, not wanting to listen to anyone and doing what he wants, let him figure out his own mess and fight his own fights! He gets to sound all pompous because he can hide behind _us_ and I won’t be a part of that shit!”  
  
The twins were hesitant as he started to head for the house. Fine, _they_ could fight. He couldn’t even believe someone in their family was acting like this! He hated comparing turmoil but he literally saved the life of a kid no older than Tony that had his family kidnapped by terrorists. Shin would be damned if he fought some concerned older brothers because his brother was a cheating bastard!  
  
“…All right.”  
  
Shin paused. What? The brothers had recovered but looked…solemn. What? The oldest muttered, “…We got knucklehead younger brothers too, we know it’s no picnic dealing with their stupid years. We’ll just tell Taiko to keep away from him and leave it at that. He harasses her though, the deal is _off_.”  
  
They simply got back into their car and pulled off without another word. They all just quietly stood there for some odd amount of minutes, just…  
  
“…Holy _fuck_ , we lost that fight” Koji rasped.  
  
Nelly buried his face in his hands, shaking his head, while Shin felt _sick_. Hell yea, they did. And _of course,_ Tony was too stupid to understand that. “They _left,_ didn’t they?! N-No thanks to you!”  
  
Says the one that did _nothing_ but _start_ that fight. The dangerous thing about Koji was you never quite knew what he was thinking so a lot of his actions came just as a distinct surprise. However, when Shin actually was able to see Koji’s ears turn red, that was about all the signal he needed as he quickly bolted back to the yard to keep Koji from _ripping Tony to pieces_.   
  
“You _stupid, fucking, lousy ass, motherfucking piece of cumslut SHIT_ ” Koji roared as Shin quickly held him back along with Nelly.

“ _Tony_.”  
  
Shin looked up, surprised, when the front door opened and Jill and Shaun appeared. Their only sister looked…angry. “You were _cheating_ on their _sister_. That should be the end of the story but you need _end notes_ , apparently. In the alternate _universe_ where I got to _date_ , and that guy cheated on me, then you wouldn’t want to intervene, huh?”  
  
Uh oh. Tony looked…shocked. “W-Well, o-of course I would, Jill--”  
  
“Oh, so you would do what they just did, huh? What about when he yells that I’m a _liar?_ Or when you ask him to just _apologize_ and be _truthful_ and he says ‘no way, I’m not doing _shit_ ’?” Jill spat, her fists balled as she got closer to her twin, “And how about when his brothers try to make things _right_ and he’s busy spouting off _garbage_ then you find yourself fighting _THEM_ because he’s too much of a punk to fight his own battles?”  
  
Oh damn. “I-I…”  
  
“Koji— _Koji_ didn’t even _want_ to fight, Tony! And then you’re so stupid in the head, you don’t even realize that those guys who came here out of rightful concern for their sister basically _pitied_ our nii-sans so much that they just relented that you’re just a _terrible person_!”  
  
Tony blanched as Jill stood level with him. Oh…Tony had grown a bit. “That’s right _, futago_. They didn’t leave because they realized they were wrong or whatever ignorance is going through your head: they said, ‘oh, this kid doesn’t even respect his own _brothers_. He’s _garbage to begin with_ ’. I can’t believe you’re standing here, yelling that they didn’t do _anything_. They shouldn’t have _had to_. They only had your back because you’re they’re brother but you were _still wrong_.”  
  
Tony trembled as Jill huffed, marching back into the house and slamming the door behind her. Well then.  
  
…Instead of _anything_ reasonable in that moment, Tony just basically ran out of the yard. Nelly watched after him before droning, “…We were taking care of him kind of stupid young. We didn’t drop him or anything, right?”  
  
“Fuck, maybe” Koji groaned.  
  
Shin patted Koji’s shoulder, “….Well, we did an okay job on one of them, apparently.”  
  
“I’m not stupid either, no matter what you guys say!”  
  
Looking back to Shaun who looked huffy, Shin smiled softly, “You’re not stupid at all, Shaun. None of you are, just…whatever you may end up going through next year, please, please try to talk about it with someone.”  
  
“I still won’t be that dumb” Shaun said dryly.  
  
Koji smirked some, “Just because you made a whole motorcycle doesn’t make you an emotional genius, _kid_. Come on, let’s ride Kamex.”  
  
Shaun excitably jumped on his bike while Shin wandered to find the keys for his Honda and the twin’s Yamaha they got for their birthday…  
  
Man. He…he had to go back to Iraq and deal with other people’s problems. He…was barely able to handle it here.   
  
…Talk about a nightmare. He…kind of missed a broader perspective on sibling matters…he missed talking to someone else at all.

No. Fuck her.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
 _It was the week before he left. His dad was getting angsty again, his mom was trying to be the strong one, and the youngers were dealing with school. Well…almost all of them. Tony started to stay at a friend’s house because why not? Shin gave up.  
  
While he was still her ‘prime choice’, near the end of May, Nesha stopped calling him. He thought maybe she’d moved on. Alas, she called him Friday and asked that he come over. Well…may as well get one last hurrah in, he supposed. She teased that she’d let him come inside of her as a parting gift. Not necessary but he was a little sloppier as a result…  
  
When they were finished, he noticed some boxes in the corner. “You moving?”  
  
“Yea.”  
  
Shin glanced at Nesha as she stared at her nails. Okay… “…I like you, Shin. You’re really loyal, y’know? Or at least diligent, you always made time for me. And you never made it too deep when we were talking. I wasn’t stressed out by you.”  
  
“Well…”  
  
She sat up on her side, gazing at him, “…You deserve someone that gives you the same energy back though. Someone that can give you the emotional support it takes to get you through what you’re going through. I don’t know about your dad but…being from a place where it’s commonplace to see people get gunned down or bodies on the street, it’s hard to commiserate sometimes.”  
  
Shin grimaced, “No, I understand that, Nesha, really…”  
  
She rubbed his bare chest, murmuring, “…You should also find someone willing to be a little more open with you about even basic shit. Like…I never mentioned I go to school in the mornings.”  
  
…Huh? “You…you do?”  
  
“Mm.”  
  
“O-Oh. Well, that’s neat though. What’s your major?”  
  
“Mining and Mineral Engineering.”  
  
…Okay, didn’t expect that. She sat up on her haunches, stretching, “…And, because the opportunity presented itself, I am transferring to the University of Utah.”  
  
…Utah. “So you’re transferring to the United States? That’s awesome, Nesha. Congratulations.”  
  
“You mean that?”  
  
“Of course I do” he assured, sitting up to lean against the headboard, “When opportunities you want present themselves, it’d be crazy not to take them. I mean, I don’t know if you’ve wanted to leave but…I guess I just kind of assumed since it’s Wasaba.”  
  
Nesha laughed, “You’re right, I have dreamed of getting out of this shithole. People don’t understand though…Odette’s mad, my mom and sister are kind of mad…I guess it’s because, should I make it out there, I don’t intend to come back.”  
  
Shin swallowed that. “…Little tough to swallow but I get it. Nothing really here to hold on to.”  
  
She smiled. She had a gorgeous smile. Tapping his cheek, she replied, “You came close, you cheeky fucker.”  
  
Smirking at that, he stretched a bit, “Well, I’m glad for that, I guess. Not like we had much hope, we started on a mistaken drug binge fueled threesome.”  
  
With a snicker, she pinched him, “Yea. Next girl you fuck around with, try to make sure you have a little less…pizazz in your intro.”  
  
“If there’s a next girl.”  
  
“There will be, if you haven’t already found her.”  
  
…Nope. She looked at him seriously, “…Be safe over there, Shin. Don’t let me see you as a statistic on the news.”  
  
“…I’ll try, Nesha.”  
  
_Well, no Tony.  
  
Shin smiled but he didn’t feel it. No, he felt like…he wasn’t going to come back to these people ever again.   
  
They all, again, minus Tony, drove here. This time, they were normal. Kind of quiet but talking when a conversation came up. He wished for the life of him he wasn’t going.  
  
Standing in the airport terminal in his fatigues, he took a deep breath and hugged Shaun. “…Thanks for a fun visit, Shaun. I really enjoyed making the motorcycle with you. Don’t break your neck on that thing and send me pics when you go to high school.”  
  
“Okay, nii-san…” Shaun frowned, “And you’re not visiting when you’re here, y’know? Come home safely.”  
  
“You’re right” Shin chuckled.  
  
Jill smiled…sadly. Ugh. Shin hugged her tight to his chest, muttering, “…I really wish you’d have told me what was going on, imoto, I feel like a failure.”  
  
“Baka” she snorted, wrapping her arms around his waist, “I…I’m just sad that you’re leaving _and_ my twin brother is such a failure.”  
  
“Oh. Well…I don’t know, Jill. Honestly, he’s gone in a direction none of us are used to but…don’t fret. I’ll miss you.”  
  
“I’ll miss you too, nii-san.”  
  
Koji whistled, shaking his head, “…A year this time. What will they expect the next go? A year and a half?”  
  
“Please let me get through _this_ first” Shin groaned, shaking Koji’s hand, “…Keep doing good in school and watching out.”  
  
“Of course. I’ll be waiting for you, Shin.”  
  
Nelly sighed, “Just take care of yourself, Shin. We’re trusting you to come back in one piece.”  
  
Shin simply nodded, hugging Nelly, before going to his dad. Yagami Yamada looked…perturbed. “…A year this time, huh?”  
  
“Yea” Shin smiled wistfully.  
  
The man exhaled before hugging him tightly, “…A year is going to be an _eternity_ but…but like your brother said, just get back here to me in one piece and I’ll be happy. Don’t…don’t try to be a hero over there, son. Just…just come back.”  
  
“…Will do, dad.”  
  
His mama was teary eyed as she kissed his forehead, “…I will send you as much shampoo as I can. I’ll be waiting for you when you come home too, okay? I love you, Sweetie Plum.”  
  
His mom just always got him a bit disheveled…swallowing, he smiled and nodded, hugging her tight, “…I love you too, mama.”  
  
Bowing as they were starting to get called to board, he murmured, “I love all of you. And…and tell Tony I love him too. See you all soon.”  
  
They nodded, waving and giving their affections as well as he headed back toward that damned plane. He stopped when, out of the corner of his eye, he saw a slip of pink disappear into the lobby.   
  
Staring long and hard, his heart was racing and telling him some nonsense like ‘go after her’. His anger said ‘no’. Firmly turning toward the line about to spirit him away again, his chest felt like stone.   
  
Round 2.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 **End Notes** :  
  
“Strollin’ through the party like my name is El Nino” has to be Top 50 most early 00s opening lyrics I can recount now to anyone. This song is Fat Lip by Sum 41.

Sigh. Just big ol’ sigh. Shin hears Crawling when he’s in the car with Joe and listens to In the End with Shaun, both by Linkin Park and off their debut album, Hybrid Theory. BREAKS MY HEART.  
  
Okay, in one of my most read works, Yume, in Chapter 13 Reverse, the character Julia, from Island of Happiness and Sunshine Islands, is introduced. This scene with Shin first appeared there. I won’t spoil why she’s mentioned again that much into the future but she takes on at least a secondary character role.  
  
Fenith Island is the island where Rune Factory: Tides of Destiny/Oceans takes place. So, Aquameleon is a boss in the Zechs/Sechs Territory, a copy of the water dragon. Its nickname is ‘Aquana’.  
  
‘Kamex’ is the Japanese name for Blastoise, one of my favorite Pokemon ever.   
  


  
  
  



	12. Day Zero

**Chapter 12:** Day Zero  
  
 **Author’s Notes:** Oki doki, ya’ll, next chapter! There’s some violence, lots of language, at times sexist and racist if not both, and some minor sexual stuff. There’s a light 9/11 mention in there too. Also, I am being VERY loose with army terminology here. I tried to keep it consistent but meh. That being said, _most_ ranking and titles are correct (sometimes, the characters are intentionally demoting).  
  
I think I’ll be able to do get two more updates before I have to take a brief updating break. If there were a queue system, I could set it up but, well, here we are, I guess.   
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Yagami Shin was going to disintegrate.  
  
He covered his eyes as the bus carried him back toward the base where he’d been previously. It was _so damn hot_ he was _seeing things_. Again, dozens of others hurled but he wasn’t in much of a better place.   
  
Yep, he was back. And, it was already starting off badly.  
  
Colonel Teramoto was at another base right now. He was not going to be coming by quite that often. Sugo was injured badly enough in the shooting that he was forced into retirement, poor guy. That, unfortunately, put wartime promoted Lieutenant Colonel Sato in charge.

Joro and Saki, the other two soldiers Shin worked well with, got transferred to another base. Per what he’d heard, Komari was still there, however…  
  
When they pulled up to base, he saw Yamada Komari out of the corner of his eye. As she had called to tell him prior to their arrival, Itoh Kasumi was right beside her.  
  
She had dark green eyes and black hair pulled back into a firm ponytail that reached her waist. She and Komari were the same height, currently standing in line awaiting orders.   
  
Shin groaned in his head when Sato appeared, appearing…contented with his new position. This…was not going to go well. He barked orders before handing out the assigned rooms. When the bastard got to Shin, he smiled. Oh, great. “Well, aren’t we lucky, Yagami? You’ll be in a room by yourself.”  
  
…Okay. “Yes, sir.”  
  
“I hope we don’t have any trouble this year, Yagami.”  
  
“Yes, sir.”  
  
Sato shoved the bedding into his hands as he walked away and Shin had to almost meditate not to roll his eyes. Maybe if he just…asked, he could go home.  
  
Naturally, Komari and Kasumi were placed in the same room, much to all the men around them delight. Komari looked unbothered but Kasumi seemed…disgusted. Yea, it was pretty gross…Sato ordered them to all ‘get a good night’s rest because hell came tomorrow’. Yep…it was all pretty disgusting right now.  
  
Trekking to his abode alone, a questionable thing, really, Shin found that not only was he _alone_ , he was almost the only one in this _corridor_. Plenty of people should have had rooms to themselves then.  
  
While he tried to think on that, he paused to find someone sitting in the room he was supposed to be assigned to, reclined on his bed. He was a squared up fake dirty blond with dark eyes, his legs crossed and his arms behind his head. Was there some confusion…? He looked up…and smirked, “Oh hey, Yagami, right?”  
  
“Yes…I haven’t had the pleasure, I don’t believe.”  
  
“Kitamura Daisuke. I’m your unit leader.”  
  
…Kitamura. “Well, nice to meet you, Kitamura-san. I look forward to working with you.”  
  
Shin wasn’t stupid, he knew this guy was about to harass him. He simply wasn’t in the mood though, heading into the room and going to his closet since Kitamura was occupying his bed. Kitamura sat up, all smiles, “I heard about your last deployment, Yagami. You accomplished some impressive stuff.”  
  
“Thank you.”  
  
“Just, y’know, that was under a different regime…” Kitamura drawled, “Things are a little different this time.”  
  
Here we go. “I will always act at the behest of my commanding officer, if that’s your concern, Kitamura-san.”  
  
“Oh, well, see to it then, Yagami” Kitamura replied, standing, “…You know, a year is a little different from six months.”  
  
No, really? “I imagine so, sir.”  
  
“Little…hard to be alone during these times, y’know? Sato got rid of all that communal shit Teramoto had. No pool, no sitting around and watching television. Got computers and stuff but he’s expecting a lot of…self-reflection, y’know?”  
  
Huh. “…Well, that should be fine.”  
  
“Hmm, we’ll see. Later, Yagami.”  
  
Shin’s eyes narrowed as the guy left the room, shutting the door. Oh, so for a _year_ , they weren’t going to do anything except self-reflect, huh? And he mysteriously was the only person in a room by himself. It’d take a lot more than this to make him crazy, he fucking saw a room full of detached eyes. Idiot.  
  
Exhausted already, he dressed for bed after he carefully set up a photo album. He’d like to put the pictures on the wall but the way that asshole just walked in here, he didn’t trust it. He did put up a copy of Shaun’s potato picture. He had brought plenty of those to make himself chuckle.  
  
He frowned when there was another knock at the door. Great, more unit leaders to come harass him. Walking over to answer, he was startled to find Komari on the other side. He yelped when she quickly shoved him in and shut the door. “Dude.”  
  
“Long time no see, Yamada” he greeted.  
  
She sighed as they bumped fists, looking at him with aggravation. “She _knows_.”  
  
“What now?”  
  
“She _knows about you_ because of that _damn Naomi_.”  
  
Shin’s eyes widened as Komari grunted, sitting on his bed. “I…I mean, I was kind of hoping I’d at least be allowed to say ‘hi’ to you anyway, Komari.”  
  
“Yea, you’ll get more than a ‘hi’.”  
  
 _Absolutely not_. “Komari, I am saying it right here, right now: I am _not_ having kinky ass sex with you in front of your girlfriend to satisfy whatever psychological issues she has. And I’m sorry if that makes me the asshole but it is not going to happen.”  
  
“Sit with me, please.”  
  
“Komari.”  
  
“Get your ass over here and sit with me, _please”_ she hissed.  
  
Shin leered as he sat on the bed. Komari looked him square in the eye, “Sato wants you gone, Shin.”  
  
“Yea, I’m picking that up quick.”  
  
Komari glared, “Shin. He wants you gone more than he wants me and _Kasumi_ gone. I know we’re _next_ but it’s insane that you’re top of the list. And you know who else wants you gone? _Kasumi_.”  
  
… “…What are you telling me, Komari?”  
  
She buried her face in her hands, groaning, as Shin tried to keep his temper down. He was not liking this. “Komari, what are you _telling me_?”  
  
“Sato…wants Kasumi to come up with something in order to frame you.”  
  
Just swell. Shin gripped the sheets, trying not to…explode. “So…what? What happens?”  
  
“I asked her—pleaded, that she not, okay? Believe it or not, Shin, you _are_ my friend and I don’t want to see you go out over some petty bullshit—I’m just blown away that he’s targeting you before us right now, it seems… _wrong_ not to be the marginalized one here.”  
  
That honestly almost made Shin cry. Why were either of them marginalized here?? “So I guess you didn’t convince her.”  
  
“Well, that’s where the…kinky ass sex as you put it comes in.”  
  
“…So if we screw, she says I didn’t do anything. But, mind, if it goes a direction she doesn’t like, she can _still_ say something.”  
  
“Look, she’s…not on her rocker but she’s very loyal to her word. And I know that doesn’t mean anything to you so I’d have her sign and endorse a letter indicating that all allegations made against you are falsified in nature or whatever. Just…”  
  
Shin felt…ill. Like, physically ill. “…Komari. Komari, I…I do _not_ want to have sex with you…no offense?”  
  
“Hey, none taken, bud, I would prefer we stay friendly” Komari assured, holding her hands up.  
  
“How? How can we stay friendly after I-I _tap you_? How would that happen?!” he demanded, standing to pace.  
  
Komari shrugged, her face gesturing a ‘eh’… “Well, you heard, right? We’re not in the same unit anymore.”  
  
…What? Feeling the blood leech from his skin, he turned to look at her, “You’re…you’re not in my unit?”  
  
Biting her lip, she slowly shook her head. “I’m under a different captain this time…”  
  
That…that was more alarming than the prospect of them having sex! “K— _Yamada_ , you had my _back_ last time—I need you. I _need_ you out there. I-I don’t _have_ a Kasumi. I have a captain that is against me and a fucking lieutenant that’s trying to frame me for assault— _Komari.”  
  
_ He _knew_ he shouldn’t have come back. Slamming down in a chair, he buried his face in his hands and tried not to hyperventilate. Komari came and rubbed his back. “Hey, look, I…I don’t know, okay? It’s our first day back, we’d have to see first. But I want you, if you feel like you’re in _any_ danger, to request a transfer, you hear me? I’ll have your back if we cross paths and there’s a problem but the other 99 percent of the time?”  
  
Right…right…he needed to lie down. Dropping his hands, he took a deep breath. “…When?”  
  
“T-Tomorrow night?”  
  
“…Okay.”  
  
“…I’m so sorry, Shin.”  
  
…Welcome back.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
It…was as he suspected.   
  
It looked like a majority of the former group were sent elsewhere, he only recognized maybe a handful of people from his previous deployment. This group was more…raucous and reckless. When they went to patrol the town, one of his unit members actually was hitting on and harassing a Terran woman. Luckily Kitamura told him to ‘stop’ but it went on for an uncomfortable amount of minutes before that point. Shin felt…pathetic after that because he didn’t say anything. No, he…he wasn’t going to be able to cover his own ass, the next time he saw that he was stopping it and making another enemy.  
  
They were going to get reported at this rate. Aside from that harassment, two soldiers were trying to pick fights with the Terrans, two stopped to take pictures, and another two were carrying their guns like they would blow anyone away, friend or foe. Shin was _terrified_.

After hours of watching the operation be mishandled, they finally came back to base…for him to get called into Sato’s office for a ‘write up’. Shin stared as Sato informed him that Kitamura wrote in his report that Shin had been ‘insufficient’ in his duties. Shin had literally been the only one that had done what he was supposed to. Sato advised it would go in his ‘permanent record’ and eventually lead to a punishment if it continued.  
  
…He had to wait at least three months before he tried to transfer. They didn’t look well upon people looking to get out in literally a day. Shin simply said, ‘yes, sir’ and exited.

He…did not sign up for _petty shit._ Like the _petty shit_ of him walking to Kasumi and Komari’s room to apparently fuck the latter to keep the other from smearing his name.  
  
Knocking on the door, he thought about how Naomi must’ve thought this would be good payback for what happened to her brother. He wasn’t sure what was going on with younger siblings nowadays but he really needed them to start thinking things through.  
  
Komari flung the door open and instantly pulled him inside. He yelped, startled, as she pushed a cup in his hands, “Drink this quick.”  
  
“What??”  
  
“Just drink it!”  
  
Shin sulked, drinking… it had a twang but he couldn’t exactly put his finger on it. It was clear like water but…  
  
 _Oh fuck_. “Komari…is this liquor?” Shin asked as calmly as he could manage.  
  
“Yea, it’s from Tsuyukasa. It’ll help calm you down” Komari explained.  
  
“Yea-a-a. I need you to get naked really fast so we can do this because liquor and I don’t combine for the purposes we need for sex, okay?”  
  
“What??”  
  
Someone cleared their throat. Oh yea. Shin glanced to the side where Itoh Kasumi was sitting on her bed, her arms crossed. Wow. He…was about to have an audience. Her green eyes narrowed as she held up a letter. “…Komari told me the agreement. Since you’ve agreed to do this, I prepared a document to clear you of any wrongdoing…when it comes to Komari and myself. She watched me prepare the letter.”  
  
Komari rushed over, taking the letter from her and handing it to Shin. He scanned it and found it…looked pretty solid and was signed. Just…ugh _._ “…Itoh-san, I…I really wish you’d reconsider. I am _simply_ Komari’s friend and I have no desire for anything else.”  
  
Kasumi was just…flat faced, no expression. “You slept with her.”  
  
“What?! No, I didn’t!”  
  
“In the same room with her for half a year, you slept with her. You saw her undress, you saw her naked, you ate food with her, you killed with her—you called her during our tenure. You call her by her _name._ You are not _merely_ a friend, Yagami.”  
  
Woah now. Was…was that killing part some sort of goal or something? “A…A _good_ friend then _._ I have no sexual interest in Komari and I-I don’t want this sort of awkwardness between us because she _is_ my good friend.”  
  
“…Come on, Kasumi, can’t you just give him the letter and give him a pass?” Komari pleaded, “Just can’t you trust me this once? Nothing happened between Yagami and I.”  
  
…At least she said something.  
  
“Your adamance is just as suspicious” Kasumi scoffed.  
  
“My adamance that you don’t _trust me_?” Komari snapped, “Or if in fact Shin _rightfully_ said ‘fuck you’, you’d smear _his_ name but use my name to do so and then make me look weak in the eyes of the army because we’re surrounded by sexist pigs?”  
  
Oh…shit. Shin looked to Kasumi, hoping this struck a chord. Like…yes, it was despicable, but having an assault story made Komari seem like a victim and a flight risk. They…they might even look to demote her back to the position she was trying to get out of! Come on!   
  
Kasumi looked unbothered. “Stop having male friends then.”  
  
…Wow. And in that second, he felt nauseous because, in comparison, he fell apart with Lyla over _nothing_. Komari stared at Kasumi hard before slowly shaking her head, “…You know, what would it feel like if I just found a new girlfriend, huh? Because _that_ ’ _s_ the direction I’m leaning right now.”  
  
Oh hell. Kasumi glowered, “ _I’m_ your girlfriend.”  
  
“After this? I really just…played along because you mean the world to me above everything. But now? You’ve really pushed it, Kasumi.”  
  
Shin yelped when Komari tugged him to lie down on apparently her bunk. Was this real life? Was this happening? This seemed like some sitcom drama movie shit, this couldn’t be life. She sat by his feet, muttering, “J-Just close your eyes and pretend I’m someone else, Shin.”  
  
How…does that even begin to occur? He did shut his eyes as Komari unzipped his pants. Deep breath, Shin. Actually, was…was this a form of…rape? Like, what do you call it when someone is blackmailing you into having sex with someone else that didn’t want to have sex? Had this ever happened before?  
  
Alas, he swallowed when…not Komari sank her mouth down over his flaccid cock. He really _swore_ that goal here would be to not even get aroused but…  
  
Her tongue swirled around the head of his cock, managing to wedge between his foreskin before dipping down to suck. He…had not featured that maneuver before and he…couldn’t say he was not a fan.  
  
All he could do was fluster as he got hard, alarmed. Damn him being a damn _ho_. Yes, yes, he knew he had no real choice since he was stimulated and he’d told Komari the same exact thing but…he hadn’t _wanted to be_!   
  
After a bit, Komari pulled away and drawled, “Um…Yagami…”  
  
“Y-Yea?”  
  
“…Do you not…like head _enough_ or something or…?”  
  
Oh, right. Right! Kasumi, their audience, suddenly snorted, “Don’t try to get him off _easy_ , Komari.”  
  
Damn it, that was easy! He could have managed to stroke himself and make himself come to end it right there! Fuck. Awkwardly sitting up, he watched as Komari glared angrily at Kasumi as she took off her shirt and pants. Oh no…he had to do things to Komari. Groaning into his hands, he wasn’t sure how to pretend on his end…  
  
“Just stick it in, Yagami” muttered Komari, taking off her sports bra before reaching down and removing her underwear.  
  
But it’d _hurt_! Getting a little…loopy headed, he glowered, “N-No, I-I will not hurt you.”  
  
“ _Shin_.”  
  
What kind of fucking monster made someone do this? Was…was this the trauma? Had…had this happened to her and now she projected it back on other people? Shin swallowed, glancing to Kasumi briefly, he figured the only way _he_ could pretend he wasn’t doing this to his good friend Komari…  
  
“Shin!” Komari squeaked as he leaned down away from her toward her crotch.  
  
She had a cute pussy…which was a thought only tipsy Shin would have so _crap_ , he was getting drunk. No, finish this quick! Just get her a little wet so it wouldn’t hurt! Turning his tongue in circles around her clit, he gently massaged the folds. He felt her inhale softly as he gently slipped a finger inside of her…and teased her g-spot.  
  
Wait, _no_. Shin, keep it together, you _didn’t_ want her to come! God, this was hard! Indeed, Komari grasped his hair, tugging him away, “S-Shin, that’s great but j-just put it inside, okay?”  
  
Obliging, relieved she was at least wet enough for him not to injure her, he slowly stuck his shaft inside of her. It…felt okay in so much as the perfunctory feeling of sex but it was still hella awkward that he was literally shafting his _friend right now_.  
  
While that should have made him sad or angry or…something, he slowly felt himself become…sleepy. Woah. Quick, had…had to come…rolling his hips and thrusting inside of her, Komari did moan as he…

Started to…doze off…falling on his elbows beside her face, she whispered sharply, “You know, _asshole_ , it wouldn’t kill you to not be good at _everything_ and not have nearly made me fucking come.”  
  
“Fuck…maybe…maybe I dun’…dunno how to be bad at…at sex, ya’ jerk…” he slurred, his eyes shutting as he basically dozed off on top of her.  
  
He wasn’t a hundred percent knocked out though he was pretty close. He heard her actually snicker after his remark before Kasumi demanded ‘what did you give him?’. Oh…oh, that was a good idea. If he was asleep, neither of them could have sex or then it would be rape…or maybe it was…was still…  
  
“You’re really going hard to protect this one, Komari! I knew when he was _calling you_ and the way Naomi talked about him that it was more than just _friends_! This probably isn’t even the first time you fucked him!”  
  
“You are so paranoid. Until your crazy psychopathic ass _blackmailed us_ into it, Shin and I have done not _one sexual thing_. Not one _romantic thing_. If you had had _any other friends,_ you could understand but you never did and now you can’t stand that I might want friends that have a penis! And you have no right to manipulate me just because I do happen to be attracted to men too!”  
  
Kasumi growled, maybe. Maybe it was Komari. However, Kasumi sneered, “Well, he won’t be here much longer either when Kitamura shows up and finds this.”  
  
Oh really…? Before Komari could respond, before Kasumi could react, Shin zipped up in a fluid motion and darted right at the crazy woman. Kasumi _swung_ at him but he didn’t have four brothers for nothing, he ducked…and grabbed the letter.  
  
“Fuck!” Kasumi yelled.  
  
Bolting for the door, he raced down the luckily empty hallways, barreling toward his room. He didn’t stop until he was behind his own door, locking it and panting, out of breath. Fwoo…that…didn’t go like he would have preferred but it worked out, huh? No blackmailing and no framing, just had…semi-unfinished sex with Komari. Win…lose…win…  
  
Teetering toward his bed, he stuffed the letter in his pillowcase before falling right to sleep.  
  
…Great. Day 1 down.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _When Yagami Shin woke up the next morning, he had a murderous migraine. He washed his face in the small basin in the room and brushed his teeth before putting on the tan fatigues. Yawning, he recalled sitting down on the bed to tie his boots when his pillow seemed to be aglow like an important item was there.  
  
…Hmm.  
  
He was lined up and prepared just as they were called. When Kitamura called roll for the unit, he gave Shin a grating stare. Oh, did things not go to plan last night, dickwad? Shin kept a neutral face as Kitamura huffed that he go get his ammunition. Okay.  
  
Like yesterday, the unit was…questionable at best, completely negligent at worse. Shin could have completely forgotten what he was here for, he was so dismayed. Alas, like an angel, the same little girl from his last deployment shyly approached him with a flower and he remembered. Patting her head, he slipped her an Airhead candy he had in his pocket. She giggled and scurried off. Yes, this…this was just a little stumbling block in the road. He was here for a purpose.  
  
After a long harrowing day with the vice captain who was lazy as all get out but luckily still no Kitamura, they rode back to base. He shook his head as he listened to guys go on about a particular Terran woman’s ‘melons’ and how ‘hot’ they were. At this rate, the Zechs and their unit would be these people’s enemies…  
  
Shin stared into his room, torn asunder as multiple soldiers basically threw his things around violently. Well…apparently, they were his too. Kitamura stood there, his face livid when he looked up to Shin. Literally…just transfer him. If he was that much of a blight, let him LEAVE. This? This was pathetic. “Can I help you gentleman with something?”  
  
The other soldiers stood up quickly, shocked, while Kitamura glared at him darkly. “…A soldier reported that you had…paraphernalia in here.”  
  
“Oh?” Shin blinked languidly, “…Some cigarettes but that’s not against protocol.”  
  
Paraphernalia. Right. Like that letter that proved they were trying to frame him. The soldiers awkwardly filed out after nothing was found, just leaving his photo album torn to pieces in an effort to find the hidden landmine along with his potato picture. Kitamura was almost stomping as he came past. “You got off this time, Yagami. I’ll just go beat off to a picture of your sister.”  
  
Shin smiled. “Is that so? I guess that’s an option. It must be a shame you won’t ever get the attention from anyone nearly as beautiful as her.”  
  
Kitamura froze as some of the soldiers coughed, apparently trying not to laugh. Gritting his teeth, Kitamura muttered, “…Yagami.”  
  
“Kitamura.”  
  
Fucking bastard. Shin absently started to clean, throwing the album and torn pictures away, pleased and relieved that he had duplicates that he carried in his cargo pants today along with that damn letter. A pat down was probably next so he’d have to get clever…  
  
Changing into the leisure uniform, he wandered out to the yard to smoke a cigarette. He had really wanted to quit but, well, that seemed unlikely now. He lit up the white cancer stick as he stood in the dry humidity of the waning night, alone in the space. A few minutes later, one of the sergeants peeked out and informed him that Sato demanded to see him. Probably write up number two._

 _After a minute, he found himself chuckling.  
  
He really should have gotten another charm.  
  
_XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
Day 3.  
  
“Gimme one of those damn things.”  
  
Yagami Shin looked up drearily as Yamada Komari approached him. It was eight in the evening and he was so exhausted, he hadn’t even wanted dinner. Well, that was for multiple reasons though. He thought the previous deployment’s food was abysmal, they literally had apple sauce and a piece of mystery meat tonight. His head was going to explode at how badly this was going when he had 362 days left. And he _was_ going to get something if he kept smoking like this. Didn’t seem like he was the only one though.  
  
Holding out the packet so Komari could withdraw one, he flicked the lighter so she could dip into it. “Didn’t think we’d be talking again so soon.”  
  
“Man, fuck them” Komari snarled, inhaling and exhaling a billow of smoke, “Kasumi can make up some fake assault story but I’m ready to tell them to go shove a stick up their ass if they try to pin the story to me and you.”  
  
Huh. Shin raised a brow at her, crossing his arms, “…Yea, how does that work? Why didn’t Itoh just make something up and leave you out of it?”  
  
“Because she’s _crazy_ , Yagami.”  
  
With a sigh, Shin drawled, “…If I’m allowed to speculate, I would figure she wants _you_ out of the army or at least back amongst primarily women.”  
  
“Must have a lot of crazy around you too, Yagami, because you’re catching on quick.”  
  
Jeez. Komari rested her elbow in her hand, blinking at him, “…You really never made good with your girl while you were back home?”  
  
“No. I was too busy sleeping with a sexy blonde that made my brain goo.”  
  
Komari smirked, “And your relationship status with this bombshell is…?”  
  
“DOA” rasped Shin, letting the smoke hover out of his mouth, “She moved to Utah to pursue her education and she doesn’t plan to come back to Japan.”  
  
Tilting her head, Komari shrugged, “Nothing wrong with playing the field, Shin.”  
  
But. Staring up at the dark night, Shin sighed softly, “…I dunno, getting here and facing this level drama right now, my perspective has started to shift on matters with her. I still feel betrayed that she didn’t say anything, I just…I just…”  
  
Komari nodded, “It felt weird going home and not seeing her, huh?”  
  
Grimacing, he tipped his head. “…I’ve never gone this long without seeing her in…what, 14, 15 years? She’s been there my whole life and I…I was angry the whole time I was at home but in the back of my head I kept thinking, even doing all the crazy stuff I did, that…that something’s missing and I’m afraid it was her.”  
  
“We get out of this, Shin, you need to go see her. Maybe it’ll click again, maybe it won’t, but you won’t find closure the way it ended off. I know she has painted a _horrific_ picture that is also in flames but…Kasumi has been my friend a long time and it’d take a lot for me to stop seeing her.”  
  
“You can be mad at me, Komari, but you really deserve better” Shin droned.  
  
Komari smirked, tapping her ashes off, “You making a pass at me now, Yagami?”  
  
“Ha, no. I mean, no offense, I know we got a little…more hands-on than I would have cared to get but I prefer us as…this.”  
  
“As do I. And it’s weird we can still talk like this after _that_ but I am glad we can” Komari nodded, “…But I won’t lie, I was a wee disappointed when the shafting was interrupted.”  
  
“You’re the worst, you know that?” Shin snickered.  
  
“And you’re being smart with this letter thing. You always think in terms of stealth?”  
  
Shaking his head, Shin sighed, “You’re an only child, Komari, but when you have five other siblings and it comes to things like snacks or drinks? Your hiding game gets to some advanced levels.”  
  
Komari laughed, shaking her head, “Oh yea, they’re messing with a pro, damn.”  
  
“…I don’t know if I can make it this time, Yamada. My unit is…undertrained, unrestrained, immature, and…like I already assessed, they don’t have my back. And then tie in Kitamura and Sato writing me up because I blink too many times. Or I can’t talk to _you_ except at random like this…and I have a year of this?”  
  
“…This is the part where we really have to remember what we’re here for, Shin: to help people. We’re talking about advanced modes? Well, this is one because we’re out here being some of the few meaning to do what we’re supposed to.”  
  
Shin recalled his conversation with Matsushima when he was a teenager, when he thought that people in the military were…like these particular people he was now working with in the military.  
  
 _“To the contrary, my boy: that’s what we allow to happen in all spheres of life. We let people whose intentions are not to help or protect or provide overtake these positions. We say ‘well, those cops are corrupt’ or ‘those men are warmongers’ and then write them all off instead of fixing it. We need people in every capacity to protect, to help. We just need to make sure they’re the right people.”  
  
“Well…it’s hard to be one person doing the right thing.”  
  
“Does that mean we’re not supposed to?”  
  
_Swallowing, Shin smiled grimly. “…Are we the right people, Yamada?”  
  
“Well, Shin, pal…there’s only one way to figure that out” Komari whispered, patting his back.  
  
…Right.  
  
Day 3.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Her sixteenth birthday.  
  
Yagami Shin sat on his cot, staring out the window as a windstorm brewed. It caused the sand to whip up fiercely and block out everything. He just silently prayed that it died down tonight because it sure wouldn’t keep them from sending him out tomorrow. Just really him though and a few other sad saps along with Komari and Kasumi. The ones they wanted gone.  
  
It was day 45 and he had been written up approximately forty times. That…wasn’t that like over 75%? While it struck him as stupid to even himself, he was actually a little worried that someone could be written up THAT many times and not have anything come of it. Like, he just made it to one weekday amount of days not being written up and he’d been here almost two months?  
  
They weren’t close by any stretch but one of the other captains advised that when the discrepancies were brought before whatever board they had going, Sato was just short of cussed out by not only Teramoto but all upper officials. “It was stupid shit, man, like ‘you didn’t complete this walk formation when you were in the village when walking under an arch’. Like, y’know, the nitpicky shit? When Sato brought it up, one of the generals asked just what fucking war was he fighting, man? Were you able to complete the task?”  
  
“…Well, that’s nice to hear. Just, I’ve gotten written up almost every day this month too.”  
  
“I wouldn’t even worry about that shit, Yagami. Sato is like one of those stupid villains in old cartoons that is like, ‘well, if I don’t catch him with dynamite, I’ll try a bomb’.”  
  
Shin rubbed his temples, shaking his head. He did not come here to be the Roadrunner for Wile E. Coyote, what the fuck? Miserably, he just…started to keep to himself. Komari was preoccupied with Kasumi insomuch that she had to keep convincing her girlfriend they weren’t sleeping together any time they were speaking. He’d concluded there was no way Kasumi was that paranoid or, in essence, ignorant. Komari and he weren’t going to be banging in the open promenade. No, she used that to make sure Komari felt like she needed to prove otherwise and thus stay away from him. He hadn’t spoken to her except in a strictly professional capacity in about four weeks now.  
  
It…was sad. He felt like he…he had gained someone that had his back over here. The first deployment, he thought they’d created a bond, a…trust. Then comes the second deployment and he’d had brief penetrative sex with her to prove that he hadn’t been banging her and now they couldn’t speak. He…he guessed Nine Inch Nails was right: everyone did go away in the end.  
  
He wrote letters to his family a lot, probably to the point that they would be concerned. One of the mailmen advised that, as far as communication went, he could probably send emails more efficiently. It was…nice, he felt way more connected to his family who he could only call once every two weeks, per Sato commandments. Others seemed to get far more leniency but, well, they were trying to make him crack. He was limited to an hour on the computer but that was more than enough. He’d told his dad they were trying to break him and Yamada responded, funnily enough that he thought it was Koji, ‘advise I’ll break their neck’. No, they…they wouldn’t get to him this way.  
  
But they did make his mind travel.  
  
In 1997, when they turned sixteen, that was when she was obsessed with Parsley. He didn’t get to spend her birthday with her as a result but that didn’t mean he didn’t want to do anything for her. So, managing to wedge a place into her schedule some time in early May, he took her, alone, to an amusement park.  
  
He remembered she was wearing a big black bow on top of her head with a black and white striped long sleeve top and a black knee length skirt with straps like overalls. With her ‘my dad is far away’ military boots, he’d thought she was super cute.  
  
She had pouted at him, “Shin, is this childish?”  
  
“Is what childish? Amusement parks?”  
  
Sulking, she shrugged as they stood in line for admittance, “…I guess. That’s what my dad always said so he never took me.”  
  
“The world can have some whimsy, Lai. Video games, manga, and anime might get deemed ‘childish’ but why can’t I keep doing those things until I lose interest if I lose interest, huh?”  
  
She had mused, her arms crossed, “…You’re right, of course. I guess I just don’t get allowed ‘whimsy’…unless I’m with you.”  
  
Pre-them being romantically involved, that Shin thought nothing of that. “Great. Just let me keep being the Keeper of Your Whimsy.”  
  
With a smile, she nodded and he had gotten them admitted. That same girl that questioned if this was ‘childish’ had immediately proceeded to drag him through every single centimeter of that park, getting all the unhealthy snacks and playing all the rigged games. She screamed like her life was ending on every roller coaster though insisted they get on ALL of them and giggled gleefully when they rode the carousel. He missed the sound of her laugh. For whatever reason, he’d told her then she was really cute and she told him he was silly as usual.  
  
Listening to the whistling of a hot desert breeze, Shin realized he’d been sitting in the dark for at least an hour now. He’d eaten, he’d taken a shower, and now? Now he just…listened to the dusty wind and thought about childish days gone by.  
  
…They weren’t going to break him. _

_She might though.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
_81 days.  
  
Aside from being nine days from being reasonably able to request a transfer, Shin found himself standing around with the other soldiers. Some were laughing and elbowing each other, goofing off as usual and suggesting they get a game of cards going. Shin…didn’t find this to exactly be an appropriate time.  
  
They had one grainy television in the mess hall. The news showed it passively but…it looked like something out of a video game, something that you would try to avoid, not…intentionally do.  
  
“…The Americans are going to want vengeance for this.”  
  
Shin looked up, surprised, when Komari was suddenly standing beside him with her arms crossed. It’d…been some days since she spoke to him. Kasumi wasn’t in the room, deeming it ‘not their problem’. Perhaps not but… “…I could imagine since they haven’t been attacked like this since Pearl Harbor.”  
  
“Luckily not us this time.”  
  
“Yea…”  
  
He swallowed as he watched it unfold again, slowly shaking his head. Having heard some soldiers indicate that it was ‘well deserved’, Shin…wasn’t so sure about that. He was reminded of Nesha’s remark that a drug dealer would shoot into a park and sleep easy. While there may have been some in that park responsible for some atrocious things, it was unlikely that…entire park was.   
  
But, that was supposed to be the ‘well deserved’ point, Shin thought absently. You get what you dole out or something. Just there was…literally no end in sight if that was the response to be expected. He wanted this to be _over_ one day. He wanted these families to be safe and these Zechs’ operatives to be properly locked up. That was it. No eye for an eye, no vigilante justice, just…clean and clear, things were the way they ought to be.  
  
Instead, thousands of people were dead or scarred. Here, one of the units managed to have a whole village of Earthmates kidnapped on their watch and were going to get court marshaled.  
  
“Hey Yagami, you must feel some kind of way, that’s half your people, right?”  
  
Kitamura. Shin cut his ‘all-American’ blue eyes at his captain who was drinking a beer, something Sato prohibited all but his favorite from enjoying. “…I’m not personally affected in any familial way, sir, if that’s what you mean.”  
  
Well…to his knowledge. His dad didn’t know any of his father’s family to his recollection though Shin seemed to remember his grandfather coming to visit them once or twice in his life. Kitamura just grinned, “Don’t be so callous, _Yagami._ I bet all Americans are related somehow, right?”  
  
Shin closed his eyes as some of the others around them started to whisper or snicker. Boy, did he hate it here. “…Wouldn’t you be a little stirred if an American suggested the same of the Japanese, Kitamura?”  
  
“Not at all, Yagami. At least it’s just one people.”  
  
Kitamura was just looking for a reason, Shin. Punching him in the nose would be that reason. Just _fuck him_. “What’s funny is I’m so lowly with my ‘half-blood’ that _some of you_ waste a shit ton of time on me but I’ve still accomplished more than both of you, _Kitamura.”  
  
_ “What’d you say to me, fucker?” Kitamura hissed, slamming his beer down on a random table.  
  
Aw, hell. He got into a fist fight, even if he let Kitamura swing first, he started it. Komari suddenly stepped between them as Kitamura advanced, her arms still crossed and eyes still narrowed, “You heard him, bitch. Maybe you need to stop starting things with your stupid ass mouth that you have to finish with your fists.”  
  
“Stay out of this, _Yamada_ , or does Yagami need you to fight his battles for him?” Kitamura spat, his eyes piercing.  
  
Ugh. There were sharp whispers from onlookers and Shin just needed this to end. He’d put in his papers _now_. Komari, alas, was completely unbothered. “You and our punk ass _sergeant_ have written Yagami up for almost _ninety percent_ of this deployment thus far. He can’t even breathe wrong around you and you want to act like this would be a fair fight? If he even flicked off one of your eyelashes, you’d go running to your _daddy_ like the bitch that you are.”  
  
Damn. Kitamura’s face was turning red as he hissed, “Say whatever shit you want, _Yamada_ , but he’s still a _pussy_ if he hides behind you.”  
  
Man, what a piece of absolute garbage. Komari _still_ looked nonchalant though! “A pussy can take a beating, Kitamura. It’s the dicks that seem to have trouble taking a hit. Which category are you prepared to fall into? If I had to vote, I really do think you’re a dick.”  
  
Kitamura blanched before barking, his hands balled, “There you go again, sounding like you’re fucking him on the side. Maybe Itoh wants to hear about this, huh?”  
  
“There you go again, trying to snitch like a bitch and announcing it in front of your entire unit. Who trusts a snitch ass bitch, huh?” Komari said mockingly, mimicking his arrogant tone.  
  
Shin scratched the side of his face while other soldiers did start to whisper. He heard one say ‘she’s not wrong, he does snitch over small shit…’. The captain was done, backing off, “…I’ll let your _disrespect_ go this time, Yagami, but you better watch your mouth.”  
  
Unable to even affect a ‘yes sir’ that wasn’t going to sound snide, Shin just nodded once and headed for the promenade because he needed his now _fifth cigarette_ for the day. Trembling as he lit up the thing that might actually kill him if this experience didn’t, he took a staggered draw, angry.  
  
…Komari saved him this time. The next time Kitamura tried that slick shit again though? Oh, the beating there _would_ be well deserved.  
  
…He’d go write up his request. This cycle? This would end.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
Day 150. Request denied.  
  
Shin lied in his cot on his back, staring at the document that reached him today after he got back from patrol. It took sixty days. Sixty days he’d hoped and prayed that he would finally get out of here and be free of this tyranny that had him written up for a hundred days.

The percentage was better but a hundred days? The only satisfactions he got was one, absolutely nothing had come of it, and two, Sato got ahead of himself and announced after that blowup in the mess hall that he ‘wished to speak to him’ in front of enough people who started to look at Kitamura differently. Yea, he got written up for insubordination after a captain harassed him over his nationality.   
  
And he got denied.  
  
Swallowing, he pursed his lips as he read the reason for the thirtieth time. ‘Inadequate population at base’. In other words, he was supposedly needed here because the numbers were down. It sure as fuck didn’t feel like he was needed though.  
  
While he had started to feel like he was losing his mind in isolation now, alone down this dark hall, Shin really was not in the mood for company but there was a knock at his door. Ugh. “…Come in.”  
  
The door opened and the shadow looked like Komari. “Dude, are you asleep? It’s 8 pm.”  
  
“I’m not.”  
  
“Then why are your lights out? Are you losing it?” Komari demanded, flipping on his lights.  
  
He squinted as she walked in, reaching out. With a sigh, he handed the paper over to her. She skimmed it briefly before shaking her head, “That’s probably bullshit, Shin. I’m sure Sato suddenly made you out to be his favorite and it would be a ‘disservice’ to him to let you move on. It’s a solid excuse but it’s not true.”  
  
“I think so too…” he murmured wearily.  
  
She sat down beside him, saying softly, “…You’re almost halfway through, Shin. And even with this stupid shit, you’ll probably get promoted.”  
  
“Komari, if I get out of here, I dunno if I’m coming back” Shin scoffed, sitting up. “I get it: my first deployment was…well, it was good. Sure, we had some crazy stuff go down there at the end that may scar me for life but it was a decent first run. Maybe I got spoiled. But this? This shit? This shit where my commanders are trying to frame me for anything from rape to insubordination? They’ve spent more time and energy trying to get rid of ME than the task at hand. We could have FOUND those people Unit 12 allowed to be kidnapped, Yamada, but they aren’t even worried about that. I-I want to be the right person to overcome the wrong people, Yamada, but this is ridiculous.”  
  
“And that’s exactly how those two got into power, Yagami: they crushed people and are more worried about settling scores than keeping people safe. If you want to back down, FINE, but that WOULD be a wuss thing to do. You know that we’re needed, don’t punk out now.”  
  
Shin groaned, gripping his temples as he droned, “Why is your girlfriend allowing you to talk to me…?”  
  
Komari smirked, smacking his shoulder, “Asshole. You think you’re the only person that needs to be able to talk to someone?”  
  
…Oh. Grimacing, he nodded softly, “…I understand.”  
  
“I wanted to give this to you too.”  
  
Frowning, he glanced as she reached into her pocket…and pulled out the pocket watch he had never wanted to see again. Once.  
  
He flipped it open, staring at the picture he had of her. He wondered if she still looked like this exactly. Two years wasn’t too long in the scheme of things but maybe her dad forced her to change her hair color to make her more ‘presentable’. Maybe she wore strict kemp buns like her mom did. Maybe she didn’t smile this way anymore.  
  
Closing it, he pressed the metal to his lips and felt ill. “…I told you I was screwing around with this woman from Wasaba, where my dad was from, right?”  
  
“Yea?”  
  
Reaching under the thin mattress of the cot, he grabbed a carton that once housed a bunch of cigarettes. He didn’t keep that letter there, no, but he kept his pictures. Flipping through them, he pulled the two pictures he got of Nesha when they were at a party and someone went around with a disposable camera. Komari took them and flipped between the two before whistling. “Well, hot damn. THAT’S someone Kasumi would need to be mildly concerned about, holy shit. One hit of tequila and I probably would have fucked the hell out of her.”  
  
“You’re the worst” he smirked some, taking the pictures back, “…I was…THOUGHTLESSLY attracted to her. She could have told me to fuck with her on the ledge of a bridge and I probably would have done it. I think dudes get an unfair shake with the whole ‘thinking with the wrong head’ but with her? I was damn sure thinking with the wrong head and couldn’t do a thing about it. That whole relationship showed me why lust is on the seven sins, I was popping DRUGS with her. I gave zero fucks about anything.”  
  
“Were you objectifying her?” Komari drawled.  
  
“I…don’t think so? I mean, she basically called me only to screw her, so if there was objectifying, we were both doing it.”  
  
Komari nodded, “I mean, not a foundation for marriage or anything but not illegal, man. You’re allowed to have fun, y’know?”  
  
“And boy, did I” Shin murmured, “…You know what she said when she gave this to me for my sixteenth birthday, this watch? It’s a family heirloom and she…she’s supposed to give it to her husband. She gave it to me instead, said ‘I don’t want anyone to ever have it except you. You’re the only one that will ever deserve it’. I…I never figured out what she meant.”

Komari frowned as he breathed out, feeling ill. “…Nesha was clear cut to me. We were just going to have sex. That’s it. Lyla meant…so many different things to me, I can’t even grasp completely everything she encompassed. Nesha told me she would never be back, I’m okay. I get it. Lyla though…?”  
  
“Because it’s different, dummy. That’s your girl.”  
  
Shin winced, clenching his head, “…She didn’t SAY anything, Komari. It didn’t even have to be a QUARTER as in-depth as you telling Kitamura off for me. Nesha could have never even been a THOUGHT to me.”  
  
“…I mean, I love my Kasumi, man, but she would have sure as hell been a thought to me.”  
  
“Stop it” he stuck out his tongue, “You know what I mean and you know you wouldn’t. She…she was everything to me.”  
  
His army friend raised a brow before drawling, “…Well, maybe I DO need to question my relationship because I…probably definitely would have let your fuck buddy ride my face.”  
  
Rolling his eyes, he sighed dramatically, “FINE, ya’ jerk, would my mind have briefly wandered? YES. But that’s all the hell it would have done. A brief wander before I got back on track.”  
  
“I’m just pulling your leg, Shin. I get it and I wouldn’t…too much. But you need to speak to her when we get back, Shin. Settle this. If she doesn’t give you satisfactory answers, move on. I know you don’t want to hear this but you still seem in love with her…but that’s exactly what I go through with Kasumi.”  
  
Shin blinked slowly, “…That almost convinced me to NOT go talk to her, that last part.”  
  
Smacking his chest, she stood, flipping him off, “Fuck-k-k you, Yagami. My girl has been through a lot and I’m not ready to give up on her trifling ass yet because of that.”  
  
“…No, I understand, Komari, I really do. I just…don’t like when the other person’s trauma comes at our expense.”  
  
Komari nodded, stretching her legs, “…I agree. Just…right now, I don’t want to give up just yet.”  
  
…Right. She left him there, telling him to get up and read a book or something. “Yes, nee-san…”  
  
“Shaddap.”  
  
He smiled and picked the letter up again, reading the words once more. Request denied. He…was going to have to continue to walk on eggshells so he could be the one doing the right thing. Face racism and ridicule for no reason for...115 more days.  
  
…He guess he wasn’t supposed to give up on a lot of things.

_XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
“My friend and me, looking through her red box of memories. Faded, I’m sure, but love seems to stick in her veins, you know?”  
  
1998\. Shin had smirked as Lyla dangled her arm out of the window as they cruised down the boulevard. It was maybe June or July, a steaming hot day. Her dad was away until tomorrow afternoon so he requested they head to the beach for a day trip. The twins were sixteen and intermediate stage terrible so they were busy and the kids were away on a school trip or something. It was just them, going down that long road…_   
  
_“Yes-s-s-s, there’s love if you want it, don’t sound like no sonnet, my lord” Lyla sang, the hot breeze traveling through her pastel locks.  
  
“This song is lame” he droned.  
  
“You’re lame.”  
  
He laughed before singing, “Why can’t you see that nature has its way of warning me? Eyes open wide, looking at the heavens with a tear in my eye.”  
  
Together, they sang as he found a spot on the busy parking lot, “Yes, there’s love if you want it, don’t sound like no sonnet, my lord.”  
  
That was back before he affiliated the song with the time he almost accidentally got her pregnant. God, that…that was the beginning of the end, right? He didn’t understand what went down but it was downhill from there.  
  
“Shin-chan, I made your favorite!”  
  
He smirked again at her as they sat out on the beach blanket he brought while she unpacked the picnic basket. “I dunno, am I a chan?”  
  
“Of course you’re a chan” she pouted, taking out the bento and handing it to him.  
  
He smiled, murmuring ‘arigato’, he opened the container and found teriyaki fish, possibly skipjack, with rice. “Looks delicious, Lai.”  
  
She contently took out a container of tea and poured it for them. He gazed at the seashore and found children giggling giddily, rushing away from the frothy waves that chased them. “Can’t believe it’s been…what, three years since our beach trip?”  
  
“Nn. It was nice” she nodded, eating a rice ball. “…Poor mama. She never gets to go anywhere.”  
  
…Hmm? Shin at that time shook his head, “That’s so miserable though, Lai. Life is short.”  
  
Or…hey, young Shin, WHY did she never get to go anywhere? What was up with that? Hell, he seldom ever saw her leave the house except when the dad deemed it necessary. Lyla herself had just shrugged before changing the subject to something like the new Tenchi Muyo episode. And he just…sort of went along with it.   
  
“Shin?”  
  
After lunch, they went into the water. Lyla had a pale yellow one piece this time, apparently secured on her own. He had been wave chasing when she called him. “Yea, Lai?”  
  
“You have a girlfriend, right?”  
  
“Yea.”  
  
“And this one is for fun too?”  
  
Shin sulked, running his fingers back through his wet hair, “…I dunno, Lai, I guess anything in life is possible but I don’t think I pick up any vibes that we’re going to be long-term. It’d be nice but there’s more to life than marriage and it’s not high on my priorities right now.”  
  
Lyla pouted at him, wading deeply, “…I dunno what that even means, Shin. It’s always supposed to be ‘high on my priorities’ now.”  
  
“Which SUCKS because we’re so stupid young.”  
  
“Did it suck for your parents though?”  
  
…Did it? In the loosest of terms…yes, absolutely and abundantly, it sucked. Alas, Lyla had something of a point: had his mom’s parents not found her, had they just been left alone, Shin truly felt that his parents would still be in about the same place as they were. Maybe they would have had some meltdowns here and there but his dad always came off as the type of person that would not back down. His mom as well, to a degree. They…definitely met stupid young but they were still together.  
  
Pondering, he patted his cheek, “…I guess it did work out for them, huh? Just I doubt I’ll have that sort of luck to meet the person I want to marry that early.”  
  
“Mm.”  
  
Well, shit, Shin. Two years later, you were declaring to someone you’d known your whole life that you wanted to marry her. Maybe he shot himself in the foot. Or maybe she…she just hadn’t wanted you.  
  
“Yagami.”_

_Shin paused, walking down the long dark hallway after finishing his nightly shower. It was March 8 th, the day after his 21st birthday. He was resigned to spending it in solitude but Komari managed to get him baklava on her ‘excursion’. Last year, they went to Baghdad and hung out at a hookah bar. This year? He was forbidden from going out for ALL of his write up over these 259 days. It was at 230.  
  
The honey sweetened nuts and flaky dough were a delicious treat and he thanked her for the consideration. She told him to stop being stupid and they shared a bottle of arak. Yea, that’s where…it probably respectably could go into write up territory. They got drunk enough with their contraband liquor that she fell asleep in bed with him.  
  
Was he religious? No, not really. But it was moments like that when some sort of overdrive in himself kicked in to wake him long enough to notice Komari was snuggled in bed with him before it was time for morning routine that made him wonder. Komari, however, was still filled with dread and for good reason: She was waiting for Shin in this dark hallway with her arms crossed, glaring hatefully at him. Itoh Kasumi.  
  
In all honesty, he really wished he could get to know her a little better. She had some really…shitty beliefs when it came to relationships but her work ethic was second to none. And he watched her hand to hand, he got lucky that once with the letter because he must have caught her off guard, she probably could have taken Koji at this point. Just, well, Komari.  
  
Kasumi didn’t move but she tapped her fingertips against her arm. Shin waited quietly as finally she snarled, “…Komari has always been a friendly type. When we were in school, she had friends of all kinds. She was too open. I was always more guarded and distrustful. Just…she got to me. At least, in a few ways.”  
  
…Mm. Kasumi’s eyes opened, cut sharply, “…Hina, Mako—after we started dating, after I told her I was the one that wanted a relationship with her, she continued to be friendly with them. I didn’t understand—I don’t understand. I—I should be enough. With Hina, with Mako, I SHOWED her I was enough.”  
  
Shin pursed his lips as she came off the wall, her fists balled. “…I worried a bit when she chose to transfer out of the other barrack to here. She was around 99 percent men. She swore to me that she would be loyal to still my concerns. When we came home to Tsuyukasa, I thought she had remained loyal. Then, when she thinks I’m away, I hear her laughing and chatting with someone— ‘baby daddy’, was it?”  
  
All he could do was blink because…that was literally the worst idea plausible but he just waved it off to Komari’s ‘don’t give a fuck’ take on life. Now? Now, how does he explain to her girlfriend they weren’t sleeping around with a name like that? “That…was a joke?”  
  
“A joke? About you impregnating her?” Kasumi spat.  
  
“…Well, I…I didn’t say it was a GOOD joke…”  
  
Kasumi scoffed, her brow tight, “The last week, Naomi brings it up to heckle. ‘Oh, I met your GOOD friend, Yagami Shin’. ‘He seems like a good catch, a respectable guy, I can see why you were ATTRACTED to his ‘friendship’.”  
  
Damn it, Naomi. Shin groaned more as Kasumi glared hard, “A ‘good friend’ was how Komari described Hina and Mako but I was able to get rid of them, proving they were worthless to her. I come here and get added incentive to get rid of you along with Komari’s infatuation. You. Some guy she apparently was alone with for half a year, she works extra hard to make sure you aren’t easily rid of—drugs you, because apparently she’s aware you weren’t like Hina or Mako. She knew you’d please her.”  
  
Awkward. “T-That’s not true!”  
  
“You weren’t so focused on her expressions, Yagami, you came closer than Hina and Mako by a landslide. You ‘fell asleep’ though. So, now, Komari defiantly continues to associate with you, comes to your defense, and is out all night with you. I’m supposed to be okay with that after you showed you can please her, ‘good friend’?”  
  
“Itoh-san” he muttered, holding up his hands, “…I would have NEVER had sex with Komari in any capacity if it weren’t for your and the captain’s blackmailing. Komari would have never either because what you’re getting lost on is ‘friends’. She’s my FRIEND and Hina and Mako—those guys were her friend too. And believe it or not, I get it: you were Komari’s friend and it turned romantic, sexual. It will not happen with Komari and I.”  
  
“And I’m supposed to trust you?” she snapped.  
  
“You’re supposed to trust Komari!” he countered hotly, “Shit! If you distrust her that much, if you think she’s just off fucking with anything that moves, LEAVE. Maybe let someone in that will trust her!”  
  
“Like YOU?”  
  
“Like literally ANYONE else—woman or man. Komari thinks the world of you but you think absolute shit of her and it’s…it’s not fair.”  
  
…It’s not fair…  
  
“…Stay away from her, Yagami.”  
  
“Like hell, Itoh.”  
  
He didn’t bother having a western showdown with her, he just walked away to his room, tired and miserable. Lying down on his cot, he rubbed his eyes before murmuring, “…Yes, there’s love if you want it, don’t sound like no sonnet…my lord…”  
  
Shin didn’t even know what that was supposed to mean. Except, he had feeling he was prepared to give, it just wasn’t poetry or whatever was required of the Okamoto family, and he was, in the end, not worthy. He…he thought he was though. And he was supposed to confront that in a few months.  
  
What…was he missing? Why…why couldn’t he be there by her side?  
  
_XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
Day 298.  
  
Shin sat in the empty communications room, a bit sleepy as he pressed the phone to his ear, holding the phone card he was able to secure. He’d get thirty minutes to speak with his family.  
  
Listening to the line connect, he recalled from an email that his dad and mom were in between phone numbers so he called the landline. It’d suck if no one picked up but, well, the house was probably almost empty now at this point.  
  
“…Hello?”  
  
Oh. “Oh…hey, Tony?” Shin questioned, a little surprised. He hadn’t talked to the kid since…hell, _he left_. It’d almost been a year.  
  
Shin frowned as there was dead silence and he cleared his throat. “…Hello?”  
  
It was still silent until, finally, his dad’s voice responded, “Hello?”  
  
…Was that punk _still mad_? Shin’s eyes narrowed, “…Hey, dad.”  
  
“Hey, son. How are you? Not much longer, huh?”  
  
“Nope.” And not a moment too soon. “…Everything good with Tony?”  
  
“Oh, don’t mind him. He finally broke down and got a job some months back and he’s positively miserable and tired. He’s not even working full time but I guess he’s not used to it.”  
  
Oh…okay. “Well, that’s good. How are the other kids?”  
  
“Jill is fine. They all seem a little…dour but I’m not sure if that’s because they’re teenagers or something else. I can’t get ‘something else’ out of them so I’m just hoping it’s the former” Yamada explained with a sigh.  
  
Dour… “Even Shaun is dour?”  
  
“Oh no, Shaun is fine. Still speed demoning around on his bike with his friend, Ann.”  
  
…A girl friend, ay? “I never met an Ann.”  
  
“She’s a ‘diversity’ student they admitted into Subami High School on a scholarship. She’s actually the daughter of a guy I used to know in Wasaba.”  
  
Shin blinked, “Oh, that’s kind of cool. Well, I’m glad he’s still…giddy. How are the twins?”  
  
“I haven’t seen Nelly in about two months now, apparently his first semester didn’t go well, as we expected. Koji still drops in on the weekend though, he indicates he’s going to be able to get out end of his third year, God willing.”  
  
Awesome, Shin smiled. “That’s awesome. I’m…I’m proud of everyone. Is mama there?”  
  
“Oh God, no.”  
  
Snickering, Shin shook his head, “You know, dad, for as close as you and mom are, you would think you’d be a little upset she’s away so much.”  
  
“Your mom has exactly what I wanted for her to have: Yagada. And if that puts her outside of the house a little, that’s fine. She deserves her empire.”  
  
Mm. Shin rested his chin in his hands, murmuring, “…You still miss her though, right? While she’s out conquering.”  
  
“…Well, it gets a little lonely. I just know she’ll be back eventually though and after all we’ve been through, that’s…that’s really the best feeling nowadays.”  
  
“…Yea, I understand.”  
  
Shin frowned when suddenly loud sirens went off overhead. What? “Something’s going on, dad, I gotta go.”  
  
“What? Isn’t it late there? What’s going on?”  
  
“I don’t know. I’ll give you a call later—love you, papa.”  
  
“…I love you too, Shin, be careful.”  
  
Jeez, his dad probably thought he was about to run into a gunfight or something and freaking out right now. Hanging up, he quickly went out to the hallway. He scowled as Kitamura rushed past, looking annoyed. “Stop beating off, Yagami! The Zechs invaded the village!”  
  
…What? Shin blanched, his mind instantly going to the little girl that gave him flowers every day. It…once again, it had been so peaceful! What the fuck?! Rushing to his room, he put on his fatigues and headed to retrieve his artillery.

If there was anything he wished they took from the Sharance experience, it was breaking up the platoon by expertise, not unit. No, Sato barked that they get into their normal units which meant he was going into basically battle with a bunch of pseudo-comrades. Over the time, they didn’t seem to think badly of him but they certainly weren’t, well, Komari or Saki or Joro. In fact, they really just kind of avoided him since he was always in Kitamura’s crosshairs. He didn’t blame them, just…  
  
Taking the Humvee’s into town, he…was _floored_ by the amount of soldiers. He couldn’t help jump when it sounded like a bomb or mine was exploding somewhere. Shit, this…this was the real deal this time. Shin almost gaped when Kitamura just flung the door open and yelled for them to ‘get out’. The real deal and they had _no plan_?  
  
He’d used the analogy of Wile E. Coyote and the Roadrunner before in regard to his time here for other purposes. Alas, this experience? This was probably actually a bit closer. He was literally on his own, ducking and dodging and shooting at the ornery Zechs who were attempting to break into the homes to apparently just blatantly kidnap the Terrans. After about two hours, he…he thought his kill count was high the last time, he was sitting at about twenty just from this event alone.   
  
“Yagami!!”  
  
Shin was hiding behind a building, jolting when he heard his name by a voice he hadn’t heard in a while. Turning his head briefly away from the bullets whizzing past the brick building, he frowned. Damn, what was his real name?? He always just called him Handsy-san last time!  
  
Well, Handsy-san had been promoted to Captain in the other platoon where Joro and Saki were transferred. In fact, all of them ran up with some other soldiers. Handsy-san looked bewildered, “Yagami, what the fuck are you doing by yourself?!”  
  
“Sir…I have literally no idea” Shin admitted.  
  
Handy-san’s brows furrowed and he peeked back around the corner. “…What kind of formation is this? Who’s running your unit and squad?”  
  
“Platoon leader is Lieutenant Colonel Sato and my captain is Kitamura…”  
  
“It’s a shit show out there, Yagami! The sun’s coming up and we don’t have the area secured at all!”  
  
Because Sato was not a leader, he was a nutcase. Shin hadn’t seen much of it prior but at least a dozen and a half of _their_ men had been downed this time. He froze. Was…was Komari okay? Joro frowned, his gun in hand, as their cover was quickly getting demolished. “…We’ll watch your back, Yagami, but you shouldn’t be out here on your own, man.”  
  
“…You’re right. I-I need to go see to something anyway.”  
  
“Be careful” Saki warned.  
  
Right. Shin waited for the shooting to stop so he could shuffle along to the next barrier, trying to catch up with his unit to make sure Komari was okay. This…this _was_ a shit show.  
  
“Soldier man!! Soldier man!!”  
  
Soldier man?? Shin quickly looked around, hiding behind an abandoned Humvee, and was shocked to find the little flower girl hiding under basically a picnic table. Shit. Rolling and crawling toward her, he quickly picked her up and guarded her with his body as bullets beamed all around them. She was sobbing as she gripped his jacket, crying in Arabic, “Papa’s dead!! Papa’s dead!!”  
  
Oh. Oh no. Shin looked to the side and saw a man lying on the ground, motionless. No. _No_. This was what they were supposed to be defending _against_ , why?! “Where’s your mama, princess?”  
  
She shakily pointed toward a house and he guarded her with everything he had, getting into the home. He yelped when he narrowly dodged getting attacked with a rod iron. “W-Wait! I’m not a Zechs, I have your daughter!”  
  
The woman was in shambles, screaming about her dead husband and how ‘nothing else mattered’. Damn it! Grabbing her and yelling at her slightly older sons to come on, he managed to get them safely into the basement of another house where several other Terrans were. About to run back out to do… _something_ , the little girl caught his hand. He turned to her, her blue eyes filled with tears, her body shaking. “Soldier man, please don’t die.”  
  
Oh God. He gave her hand a brief squeeze, reminded of when Jill was small, and smiled, “Don’t you worry about me, princess. I’m here to keep you safe.”  
  
…But there were hundreds of soldiers out there and until the other squad showed up, he had been essentially alone. Taking a pistol off his waist, he handed it to the little girl’s mother. “Anyone comes in here that looks suspicious, shoot them.”  
  
The woman looked…astonished, but nodded rapidly. He left the building in the back as to not raise suspicion, keeping a mental note of the location in case it was leveled so the Earthmates could be dug out. He glanced off and saw Joro and Saki back to back, one declaring the way safe when the shooting cleared in their direction.  
  
“Yagami!!”  
  
Shin looked up, alarmed, finding Kitamura and a bunch of soldiers just crouched on the ground, covered in dust, at the building next to the one he came from, an opening of about two meters between them. Kitamura looked annoyed, “Come the fuck on, Yagami!! We have to fall back!”  
  
…But…was the way clear?  
  
“ _Yagami_ , come the fuck on!!” Kitamura snapped, peaking around the bend.  
  
…Shit.  
  
Sitting back, he could almost laugh at it now because never in a million years would he have trusted that son of a bitch. Then, he was the stone-cold dummy that believed that same negligent bastard had some grasp on anything that just…ran across the opening.  
  
Something made him freeze. He thought it might be fear. No, he saw a brief spray of blood and wondered whose it was. He looked to his shoulder with a giant hole going through it and realized it was his.  
  
“Fuck!! Yagami, get down!! _Get down_!!”  
  
It wasn’t even Kitamura that screamed that, it was Handsy-san. Shin quickly clambered back to the building, his head ringing as he tried to register what in the hell was going on. Looking to his shoulder again, it…very slowly started to register.   
  
Holy shit, he was shot.  
  
Shaking, he looked to his arm and found he had bullet holes going down his entire left arm. Oh. Oh.  
  
Trying not to panic, he almost jumped into the sky when Joro, Saki, and Handsy-san made it to him. Joro looked pale, “DUDE. Dude, are you okay?!”  
  
“I-I think so” Shin barely whispered.  
  
“What the FUCK, Kitamura?!” Handsy-san screamed toward the other side, “You didn’t even _clear,_ ya’ dumb fuck!! You almost got Yagami killed!!”  
  
Shin wearily glanced to the side and found all the blood drained from Kitamura’s skin, the other soldiers looking paralyzed. Huh…was that intentional? Maybe he hadn’t expected other people to see…  
  
Oh. Shin sobbed, crippling over. “Oh fuck—fuck, there-there goes the pain, fuck.”  
  
It really hadn’t even felt like anything initially…now it felt like his entire arm was on _fire_. Handsy-san glared hard in Kitamura’s direction, “We’re getting you back on our bus, Yagami. I don’t know what the fuck I’m looking at here.”  
  
…A request denied that almost took his life.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _It was…maybe pre-pregnancy scare. In fact, when he thought about it, the event he thought was where he might have gotten her pregnant, she was upset about something. After they were done, the following day, she asked if they could…go get drinks. He kind of honestly got why alcohol got a bad rep, it…literally led him to some pretty crazy situations.  
  
Shin was sitting at the bar, swirling a beer as he watched Lyla drink tequila. He’d asked what was wrong but she assured it was nothing. Trust was lacking everywhere, it seemed.  
  
Luckily that time, they’d been within walking distance of his apartment so after about an hour or two, she told him she was done. He paid their tab and…that ought to have been it.  
  
His stupid self was impaired a bit…and, unfortunately, so was Lyla. When they got in the elevator, she said the most overused porn line he never imagined to hear in life: “Shin-chan, I want your cock…”  
  
He’d looked at her as she curled against him in the moving transport, unzipping his pants and gentling kneading him over his boxers. Gnawing his lip, he tenderly pushed her hair back, pulling her into a sultry kiss. As much as he would like to say he was going to be the responsible one, if Lyla said she wanted his cock, his cock she would get. It sounded…like the epitome of self-serving but really, Lyla…Lyla could have whatever she wanted from him.  
  
Thankfully the hallway was empty when the doors opened so he could push her back up against his door, lifting her up to wrap her legs around his waist. She roughly grabbed the back of his shirt as he got the door open, kissing her hard as he recklessly searched for a surface. Ah, the counter…perfect.  
  
Lyla tugged his shirt off, slinging it aside as she nipped his neck, running her hands down the dip of his back. “Nn, Shin, please, I want it bad…”  
  
She had on a cute pleated skirt that…could stay on as far as he was concerned, pushing the article out of his way so he could teasingly rub her over her panties the same way she was teasingly stroking his dick right now. He chuckled as she grumbled, probably displeased. Squeezing her nipple before reaching down and pulling the slinky things off, he rubbed her clit. Fuck. “I love how fucking wet you get, Lai…”  
  
He always wanted to crack up when Lyla got raunchy because it was just so out of character, especially as she sat up and growled, “Then put your dick inside!”  
  
“Yes, ma’am” he grinned lazily.  
  
She moaned contently when he slipped inside of her, her hands gripping his shoulders as he rolled his hips. “Oh. Oh, Shin, ha-harder. Harder.”  
  
“Mmm…” he rasped, pushing his length in further. It felt so good..  
  
Lyla was completely embracing him, her soft exhalations ringing in his ear. She murmured, “I love you so much, Shin. I…I want you so bad…but I…I can’t…can’t have anything.”  
  
_…What?  
  
Yagami Shin grimaced, opening his eyes, confused. He was lying in an infirmary bed. His arm was wrapped up and in a sling…  
  
…Oh yea, he’d been shot.  
  
Fearfully, he stared down at his left hand before daring to flex his fingers. First the thumb, the pointer, the middle, the index, the pinky…  
  
…Okay, it…hurt like hell but he could do it. He…he hadn’t lost usage of his hand. Daring to move his arm, well…that wasn’t quite as smart a move. He almost bellowed with agony.   
  
“Stop that, Yagami.”  
  
He yelped, caught off guard, when a doctor sauntered up beside him. It…wasn’t the doctor he was used to. Crap, had Handsy-san really brought him back to their barracks? Sato would shit a brick and say he abandoned post!! “Relax, Yagami, you’re at your base, but since I was treating you, I came with.”  
  
“O-Oh. Thank you, sir.”  
  
“You’re lucky, Yagami, those bullets could have ripped your arm apart. You got hit by three bullets in the arm and one through your shoulder. You have some torn muscle and tissue so you’re basically wearing that sling up until the last week of your deployment.”  
  
“…What am I going to do with my arm in a sling though, sir?”  
  
“If he’s still your lieutenant after this, Yagami, that’s going to be between you and him.”  
  
…Huh? “I will say you will definitely not be able to hold a gun for a while so you’ll probably be on light duty.”  
  
Great. Just…great. “…Thank you, doctor.”  
  
“Shin?!”  
  
Looking up, he grunted when arms wrapped around his neck. Eh? Oh. Oh! Fuck, he…Shin took a deep breath of relief, hugging Yamada Komari with his good arm. “…Fuck, I was worried. You’re okay.”  
  
“ _I’m_ okay?! You jackass, you were _shot_!!” Komari snapped.  
  
“Yea…”  
  
The doctor wandered away, about to pull the curtain, “…Per protocol, Yagami, I had to call whom you listed as your first contact in your personnel file in case something happened to you.”  
  
… _What_? _Nooooo._ Shin gaped, feeling the warmth leave his body. His ‘first contact’ was his _dad_ who was _terrified by this very scenario_. “D-Did he pick up?”  
  
“Oh yea. I’d, uh, give a call when you’re feeling up to it.”  
  
“Oh my God” Shin whined, burying his face in his hand, “My dad is probably _losing his mind_ , oh my God.”  
  
Komari rubbed his back as the doctor left, quiet for a moment. “…Shin, what the fuck happened? I ran into Joro and Saki, they are _pissed_. They said Kitamura pretty much _let_ you get shot.”  
  
… “It’s…it’s my fault” he mumbled, “I-I know not to trust him but I was worried about another ‘insubordination’ write up so I came at his beckoning and got capped four times.”  
  
“Could you have seen from that angle?”  
  
“…Not completely, but--”  
  
“Could _he_ have seen from that angle?”  
  
“…Possibly. Probably.”  
  
Komari’s jaw grew taut as she gripped his good hand, “…If I catch him in the hall, we’re fighting on sight, that lousy son of a bitch.”  
  
…Ugh. His head hurt and he was tired. Tipping her head, she drawled, “Why don’t you give your dad a call and then I’ll bring you something to eat from the mess hall, okay? Just lie in here and take it easy.”  
  
“…All right. Thank you, Komari. And really, I’m…I’m glad you’re okay.”  
  
“…Someone had my back out there, Yagami. I’m…I’m sorry I didn’t have yours this time” she said faintly.  
  
Watching her walk away, he grimaced. Yea, that…that was the battlefield on his own right there. Granted, he did…fine. Actually, he probably did a little better than usual…up until he had to trust untrustworthy people.   
  
When he got to his feet, he felt deep dread as he requested to use the phone to call out. They allowed him fifteen minutes and he dialed the landline, praying his dad had just…gotten tied up with something else because this was not a conversation he wanted to have right now.  
  
The phone rang literally once. “Shin? Shin, is that you?”  
  
Damn it. “Yea, dad, it’s…it’s me. I’m--”  
  
Before he could fathom saying ‘okay’, his dad _flipped_. “What in the _hell happened_?”  
  
“I--”  
  
“The doctor said you took _four bullets_ to your left side. _Four bullets_?”  
  
“Dad, it was not—it was not _intentional_ , I promise you _that_. I—It was a…tactical error.”  
  
He said, bullshitting entirely. “A _tactical error_?” Yamada echoed, his voice getting…crisp, “Is that what I should have put on your memorial?”  
  
“I’m not _dead,_ dad, I’m talking to you right now!”  
  
Oh, thank GOD, he heard a woman’s voice on the other side. Shin sighed with relief when his mama’s voice took over, “My Sweetie Plum, are you okay?”  
  
“I’m fine, mama. Please, explain to dad that I am _fine_. I-I am not dead.”  
  
Great, he was on speaker, apparently. “You got shot _four times,_ Shin. Someone meant to _kill you_.”  
  
“ _Everyone_ means to kill me, dad, that’s kind of the point of war!”  
  
“Then I shouldn’t have let you go!!”  
  
Dana huffed, “Stop it, both of you. Yama, _relax_. I know it’s _hard_ but this is our son on the other end of this phone communicating to us that he is _all right_. Take a deep breath, come back to the present—he is fine.”  
  
…Shit. Shin winced as his dad fell completely silent. Right…right. Old Shin took…quite a few bullets too. “I…I’m sorry, dad. A…A Zechs soldier popped up after…after we checked and I was about to do a crossover to rejoin my unit. I fell back and was treated immediately. The…the doctor said I just need to keep my arm in this sling until it’s time for me to go so I probably won’t even see a patrol anymore.”  
  
Well…maybe. Some of it was an outright lie and some of it may end up being an outright lie. Finally, his dad rasped, “…You’re okay?”  
  
“I’m okay, promise.”  
  
“…Come back to us, Shin” Yamada whispered.  
  
Shin swallowed, “I…I will, papa.”  
  
“What the fuck do you mean he got shot?!”  
  
This was about to be the loudest most nerve bending ten minute call to ever happen, Shin groaned when he heard Yagami Koji’s proclamation. “Yo, Shin, what the fuck?”  
  
“ _Hello_ , Koji. There was a large scale attack of the town we protect here by the Zechs. I was securing a location and a Zechs soldier shot me in the arm. I am _fine_.”  
  
He squeezed the bridge of his nose as he wedged the phone against his good shoulder because it sounded like Jill was reporting the details to Koji on the side. “Four _fucking times_ , Shin? Where was your buddy that’s supposed to have your back?!”  
  
“We were _scattered_. Ya’ll, it is not a _tidy affair_ over here. It’s pandemonium when stuff like this happens!”  
  
Dragging his fingers down his face, he shook his head when _Nelly_ came next, demanding what happened. Good lord. “Shin…dude.”  
  
“Is everyone there that cares at this moment so I can reiterate this one more time?” Shin demanded, his voice a bit sarcastic, “I am fine. FINE. I will have to wear the sling for two months then I will be home and you can see my bullet wounds.”  
  
“Were you scared, nii-san?” Shaun asked.  
  
… “A…A little, Shaun. Honestly, I…I didn’t know what happened at first. It didn’t hurt like it looks like it does in the movies right off the bat.”  
  
He groaned, rolling his eyes, when he heard his dad say ‘they could have _shot him in the head’._ He needed to change his first contact. Jill whimpered, “ _Nii-san_ , we love you and we’re not there so we can’t see what’s going on. I’m sorry if we’re seeming bothersome but all the doctor told us was you were shot and in surgery. Everyone was frightened.”  
  
Oof. “I…I know, imoto, I understand, really. It’s…it’s okay though, I swear to you that I’m not on my last leg or anything.”  
  
Shin looked up wearily when the proctor advised ‘three more minutes’. “Hey, um, my times almost up so I need to get going.”  
  
“‘Time’s almost up’?” Koji echoed, “You get _shot_ for them and they still have your phone calls on a fucking timer?”  
  
“Well, some…some people didn’t make it, Koji, they probably need the line for those calls.”  
  
Dead absolute silence. Yea, this call didn’t need to happen again. “Everyone, I-I will see you very soon and we’ll put this all behind us, okay? I love you all so much and I can’t wait to see you. I _will_ see you soon, okay?”  
  
“…I’m holding you to that, Shin” Koji muttered.  
  
“I know.”  
  
“I love you too, nii-san” Jill proclaimed, “Please, stay safe.”  
  
Everyone echoed similar sentiments before his mom murmured, “…I felt something. It was about two, three hours ago. Was…was it then?”  
  
Glancing at the clock, Shin slowly nodded, “Yea, three hours ago now…”  
  
“…Okay. Be safe, Shin, and call us if anything changes, okay?”  
  
“I will, mama. Love you.”  
  
“I love you too, Sweetie Plum. I’m here waiting for you, okay?”  
  
“All right, mama…”  
  
“…Shin.”  
  
God, dad. “Yes, papa?”  
  
“…I…I don’t like to be selfish. I don’t really know exactly…how to be, I suppose, because I never had anything before I had you all. I just…I just really, really, _really_ need you to come back, okay? No question, I…I need you here, Shin. Please…”  
  
“…Of course, dad. It’s…it’s about to wrap up and I’ll see you soon, I swear to you. Don’t worry. I love you, okay?”  
  
“…I love you too.”  
  
Feeling ill, he hung up and went back over to his hospital bed, lying back down and trying to sleep. That…that was tough.   
  
Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out the watch he now carried with him and flipped it open. Staring at her picture, he frowned. They…were really drunk but…had she said that? If she did, what…what did she mean?   
  
Why…why was _nothing_ clear right now? Why…why was he so lost in _everything_?  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
Day 300. Corruption.  
  
Yagami Shin got shot on Day 298. He was still in the infirmary until the end of Day 299. This morning, he woke up to raucous knocking. Confused, he got up, and it was Kitamura.  
  
 _“You lazy or something, Yagami?! Get ready for patrol!”  
  
_ Patrol. As in…that task he did where he needed to be armed in case what happened two days ago occurred. He had stared at Kitamura, his mind incapable of registering this…nonsense. _“…I’m on medical leave at least until the end of this week, Kitamura.”  
  
“Sato denied it.”  
  
“The doctor OUTRANKS Sato.”  
  
“That OTHER doctor cleared it. OUR doctor indicated you can do patrol. Now quit making shit up and come on.”  
  
_Shin managed to get dressed with one arm before going to the armory. The soldier in there running the inventory looked…very confused. _“…What are you going to do out there, man? One hand shoot like James Bond the whole time?”  
_  
 _“I guess so”_ Shin said wearily.  
  
The man’s brows had creased, giving him a couple berettas and body armor. “… _Man, good luck. You need to sue or something.”  
  
_ Shin needed to have one armed beat Kitamura’s ass and got himself dishonorably discharged. There was no… _reason_ for this. The rest of his comrades stared at him in shock, whispering amongst themselves that there was no way they’d have come out here unarmed. Yea…none of them were being targeted by a psycho.  
  
It was hot again, he thought, groggily wiping his brow with his good hand. The sling made it extra hot too. Walking along the paved streets, he watched the Terrans try to rebuild. Shin couldn’t help but feel their eyes sharply pinned on them. He saw the graves, around fifty Earthmates were killed. Yea…they didn’t do their job.  
  
“Soldier man!!”  
  
…Oh! Shin quickly looked around and smiled softly when the little girl approached him. Good. He noticed her mother walking warily behind her as the child presented him with pretty blue flowers, as usual. “…Are you okay, princess?”  
  
“I am fine…you got hurt” she whispered, looking at his arm.  
  
“I’m all right. I’m glad you are too.”  
  
Her mother got closer, saying very faintly, “…Thank you for-for saving my family.”  
  
“…I’m so sorry I wasn’t able to do more, ma’am. Do…do you need anything? Is there anything I can give you?” Shin murmured.  
  
She shook her head, “…My brother lives in Ukraine. We will be going to live with him. It…it will be safer.”  
  
Shin swallowed that and nodded, bowing, “…Your daughter’s flowers got me through this so I…I thank you both for your kindness.”  
  
The little girl looked tickled, reaching to squeeze his hand, “If you crush the flowers and put them on your wounds, Mr. Soldier Man, they’ll give you strength! They’re called ‘rune flowers’.”  
  
“I just might do that, thank you.”  
  
“…You are a decent man, I can sense that” her mother said, staring him deep in the eye with her dark ones, “…You are not around decent men. Do not turn your back on them.”  
  
“…Yes. Thank you.”  
  
Watching them depart, he felt a bit sad but…relieved. If something happened to that little girl because they weren’t organized, he’d flip out. If something happened just now, he couldn’t have even protected her _that_ well…this…  
  
He wandered around, checking and making sure he didn’t see any suspicious individuals. His arm…hurt something fierce though and he was nowhere near any meds. Gritting his teeth, he just tried to keep it steady and not think about it.   
  
“… _Yagami_?”  
  
Uh oh. Shin’s eyes widened as he looked to the side. In a car was Colonel Teramoto, the man staring at him with…disbelief, perhaps. “…Yagami, what in the hell are you doing out here?”  
  
“U-Um…patrol, sir?”  
  
“…With one arm?”  
  
“W-Well, I…I have a couple beretta.”  
  
Teramoto stared at him like he was an idiot. He was. “…Get your crazy Mission Impossible ass in here, Yagami.”  
  
“Yes sir…”  
  
Why was he here though? Shin got into the back of the vehicle as Teramoto huffed, looking to another higher up in the seat beside him. “…This is Yagami. One of my best soldiers a year ago. Now he’s apparently expected to be Rambo. Did the doctor not flag you for medical leave or work restrictions, Yagami?”  
  
“I…I was supposed to be staying motionless the rest of this week, sir, before I returned to light duty. Kitamura came this morning and advised me that I was still supposed to be on patrol. He said the doctor I saw wasn’t one of ours and that our platoon’s doctor said I was ‘fine’.”  
  
The mystery officer glanced to Teramoto, bewildered, “…A one armed soldier is not ‘fine’, Teramoto. I think we can officially say they made a mistake letting Sato have this base.”  
  
Teramoto just shook his head, looking out, “Just between those in this car, Yagami, but Sato and his various lackeys have been reported to us for negligence. The major officials were putting it off because of the necessity of leadership right now. However, another base that was called to help secure the area, every last soldier there reported the unit for lack of leadership, no protocol, no formation…and your old crew, they were very indignant that apparently Kitamura allowed you to get shot because he didn’t check once.”  
  
Grimacing, Shin nodded quietly. Teramoto snorted, “…Now, they have you out here without an assault rifle expecting to shoot people that have come at us with assault rifles. They give you a couple berettas and a dandy ‘fuck you’, I guess. Despicable. Sato is going to be court marshaled up the wazoo.”  
  
“What about Kitamura?” asked the other official.  
  
“We’ll let him finish his tour. With Sato out of the way, he’s lost all his power and should be more on edge about doing the wrong thing. Yagami…play it entirely safe and don’t tell anyone you saw me. If you see Zechs coming…yell to warn everyone and _run_. You are a sitting duck. We’ll have this fixed tonight.”  
  
“Y-Yes sir. Thank you.”  
  
Teramoto didn’t say anything as he exited the vehicle and continued to walk around. While he kept his eyes pinned, he focused on helping the Terrans clean up. It took three hundred days but _supposedly_ this hell might be taking a turn.  
  
…65 days to go.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
“You’re a snitch, Yagami.”  
  
Day 310.  
  
Yagami Shin was sitting in the mess hall with the strange combination of Yamada Komari _and_ Itoh Kasumi. The latter was at such a loss of Komari defying her wishes, Shin guessed the next best option was to just join. She said absolutely _nothing_ to him and she didn’t last very long in the scheme of things, usually just around for ten minutes before taking off. Currently, his mama had sent him a box of Cinnamon Toast Crunch expedited and he was enjoying a bowl, everything just briefly right with the world. Until this douche came to talk to him.   
  
Eating another spoonful, he looked up drearily at Kitamura. Komari admitted she’d never had cereal before but was currently eating the helping he’d offered Kasumi which she didn’t eat after finishing hers. The abrasive woman leered, munching before drawling, “Fuckturd, don’t you see we’re off the clock and don’t have to deal with bullshit right now?”  
  
“…You need to go down to the dorms, Itoh, Yamada” Kitamura said lowly.  
  
Kasumi stood without preamble but Komari smirked, raising a brow at her, “Whaaaa? You _fucking him_ or somethin’?”  
  
“Don’t be sick.”  
  
“Then sit. Only _I_ tell you when to go down when we’re off the clock.”  
  
Shin almost expected Kasumi to snap at Komari but, surprisingly, she smirked as well and sank back into her seat. Oh…right, they…were in a relationship that wasn’t entirely hinged on hostility, he just hadn’t seen it before. Kitamura’s ears were turning red at the defiance but literally…they were done for the day. Give it a rest.  
  
“What are you talking about, Kitamura?” Shin asked, pushing his bowl out of the way after he finished his milk.  
  
“You don’t think everyone doesn’t know you got Lieutenant Sato fired?” he snapped.  
  
Blinking languidly, Shin drawled, “…I didn’t turn anyone in. The entire other platoon that came and saw the shit show he was running were appalled that we allowed over a dozen Terrans to die and lost as many men as we did. And, oh, yes, how you told me to run across open shot range to get shot. You remember how about a dozen people were watching that, Kitamura?”  
  
“You--”  
  
“And you have some balls, coming here talking to me about _snitching_ on Sato when I let every single bullshit thing you and that asshole did ride for _three hundred days_. _Ten months,_ Kitamura” Shin’s eyes narrowed, “I didn’t even turn in the fact that you and him forged my medical documents and had me running around enemy territory with a pop gun for _three days_.”  
  
While Teramoto assured he’d be done with that crazy under-armed patrol gig within the day, it went on for basically the full week. The doctor that treated him so happened to call the other physician who never even saw Shin to get an update and was _livid_ to learn he was just out here. The _doctors_ turned Sato in.

Kitamura gritted his teeth as Shin stood up. Fine, if he got kicked out in the last 55 days, so be it. He was about done with this. The other soldiers there instantly perked, coming to observe as Kitamura tried to hide his surprise. “…I’m from the industrial parts of Tokyo, _Yagami_ , I don’t think you want to do this. And I’m not holding back because you’re crippled either.”  
  
“I’m from the worst slums of Japan, _Kitamura_ , one arm is all I need for your soft ass.”  
  
That punk asshole actually _tagged_ his arm with bullets he got because the prick _let him get shot_. Kitamura actually came around to swing _again_ on his arm but Shin was done: he was _pissed_.  
  
Managing to side step his swipe, Shin stepped right up to him, pulled his good arm back, and punched Kitamura _square_ in the jaw.  
  
Koji used to say the sound of his fist connecting to some fucker’s jaw was like music to his ears and Shin would call him a psycho. Alas, in this moment, that crack of knuckle meeting flesh was like hearing his favorite album in one second and Shin understood completely. Kitamura yelped, actually crashing to the ground as the soldiers hooted, laughing and cheering.   
  
Dropping his arm, he looked down as Kitamura tried to get to his feet, stumbling as if he was off kilter. Shin was ready for more but the bastard held his jaw, seething, “I-I’ll get you dishonorably discharged for that, Yagami!!”  
  
Komari didn’t even have to say anything, the onlookers suddenly taunted, ‘then who’s the snitch now, Kitamura?’ and ‘snitches get stitches, prick!’. Kitamura gaped at them before his eyes narrowed sharply, stomping out of the room. Darn, Shin was hoping he could hit him one more time…  
  
So, he sat back down, pouring himself another bowl of cereal. Komari was smirking very widely at him, “Feel better now?”  
  
“I feel excellent now, actually.”  
  
“Kudos, though you should have popped his ass a long-g-g-g time ago.”  
  
To be honest, Shin never did learn what the deal was fully with Kitamura. He heard various rumors over time but one was that his father was a celebrated commander and Kitamura wasn’t rising through the ranks as fast as the man liked. Sato probably promised to get Kitamura promoted if he managed to get rid of him. Now, with that opportunity out the window, Shin had only managed to get in his way.  
  
When…he sat back and thought on it now, he…he had little animosity against Kitamura. Five percent of a miracle was very difficult to be a part of.  
  



	13. Live With It

**Chapter 13:** Live With It  
  
 **Author’s Notes:** No smut, just violence and some macabre. This requires suspension of belief too but, if you’re not new to my series, you know those Yagami ways.   
  
So I will need to take two days off from posting. I’ll be back early Sunday with the next chapter. Enjoy!

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When Okamoto Lyla failed to say anything to her prejudiced father, sometimes different occurrences happened in his head. Mostly it was just what the man said changing, really, but it wasn’t always clear in his memory.  
  
What happened on Day 363, June 10th, 2002, two days before he was supposed to go home to his family? That day wasn’t always clear either.  
  
Yagami Shin stood in line as their new lieutenant barked at them to complete a provision run to a smaller base in the middle of the desert. Typically, this was left to Aden’s unit, from what Shin had heard but they were in the middle of some other fire fight and unable to complete the task. It sounded like a simple enough assignment. They’d be back tomorrow and he could pack and go home. Everyone was in a good mood.  
  
“Ah-h-h, I can’t wait to go to Tsuyukasa and just soak in a hot spring” Komari sighed contently as they waited to be put on the plane.  
  
“Mm, I can’t wait to see all my parents and siblings and just…sleep.”  
  
He realized he hadn’t slept very well in the last year. Being all alone, he started to get a little…paranoid that he was placed alone for _other_ reasons. That night Komari fell asleep with him was the last decent night of rest he’d had and that was months ago. He was just pleased that the isolation didn’t crack him.  
  
Looking up at the plane, he whistled lowly. It was _huge_. He heard it could carry tanks and other smaller airplanes. Right now, it was just being used to carry about a hundred of their platoon and months of food supplies and artillery. Kitamura shot him a bland look as they stood outside, his face registering disgust. They hadn’t really…chatted much since the punch-out but that was fine with Shin. The poor guy though, he must’ve thought a supply run was so below him.  
  
Sitting down in a row with his unit, Shin smiled as he thought about the next time he got on a plane, he was going back to Japan. When he got home, he was…well, he was done for a while. They might send him back in a year or two but now he had time to make some plans, figure out a career…maybe…maybe figure some other things out too..  
  
It was a bit uncomfortable, there were very few windows in the plane which made it feel like they were in a moving box. One guy actually got a bit sick, throwing up and saying they were in a ‘metal flying coffin’. Shin smiled as other soldiers heckled the poor guy about his motion sickness but cheerfully gave him some Dramamine. Everyone was in good spirits.  
  
Cracking his knuckles on his now freed arm, Shin sat back to relax, the Air Force pilot relaying it’d be another two or more hours. Enough time for him to catch some shut eye…he’d been responsible for mail delivery and laundry sorting for the last two months and he had to say it was mind-numbing work. He wondered what was for him though…  
  
An hour. He was asleep for an hour. Something made him come to though. Staring groggily into the gray space before him, Shin rubbed his eyes and stretched. The soldiers had been raucous the whole time so that couldn’t be it…he sat there, tired, for a moment and listened to some banter. About to try to coax himself back to sleep for the last hour, his ears felt like…whirring. Or no, something was whirring but it didn’t sound like the airplane, what…?  
  
Perhaps…five meters in front of him, where the new lieutenant and several other captains were sitting, something literally punctured through the bottom of the plane…and exploded.  
  
What?  
  
 _Everyone_ was screaming as absolutely _nothing_ registered in Shin’s head about what just happened, only shattering _ringing_. He gritted his teeth as the air pressure from the hole in the bottom was dragging everything loose toward it. Shit.  
  
It hadn’t separated the cabin, someone was still _flying_ but they were _definitely_ flying toward the ground now. The deceleration was _fast_ and if they didn’t put the landing gear down, well, whoever shot a _rocket_ or _bomb_ at them was the least of their concern. Shin quickly yelled at his unit to put on the parachutes. If…if nothing else, if they had to jump out, they had that?  
  
They were…they were almost to the ground when another rocket…ripped right through the front of the plane. Shin’s world turned white when he heard the screams of the pilots and burning. Burning. _No_.  
  
“Grab on to something!!” Kitamura screamed.  
  
Holding on to _anything_ for dear life, the descent the rest of the way was terror incarnate. The plane hit the ground _fast_ and _hard_. It…was just _luck_ that they hadn’t been but maybe about three meters off the ground before apparently their pilot was murdered.   
  
Shin loaded his AK47 and a soldier next to him, Soga or something, pale as a sheet, yelped, “W-What are you doing, Yagami?!”  
  
“Someone’s _attacking us_!!” Shin declared, incredulous.

Sure enough, whoever it was that was on the warpath, ripped the doors off the plane and started shooting first. Fuck, everything was on fire. Kitamura shot at some of the rebels and was screaming but not screaming _orders_. The guys next to him looked helpless. Aww, fuck.  
  
“Crawl to the back of the plane!! Get several soldiers to cover you and force the supplies out through the cargo doors before this plane blows!!” Shin bellowed.  
  
“Y-Yes!”  
  
“Yagami!”  
  
Shin looked to Komari who was holding her rifle, Kasumi beside her. “What’s the plan, Yagami?! I’m not looking to explode today!”  
  
Glancing to the back, Shin found they’d managed to get the doors open but were still taking artillery damage all around. They were surrounded. _How_? This was a _supply run_!!  
  
“…Front to back. Everyone go out the cargo doors but the front face the front, back faces the back, and the flank guard the windows.”  
  
“Back to back, flank to flank, everyone!!” Komari yelled.  
  
Once upon a time, Shin would have never chosen to be right up front. First, because he may have been the first one to be killed, and two, because he’d be forced to kill a lot of people. Today though? When he was supposed to be _home_ in two days and these fuckers were messing with that? He got up front and opened complete fire. Damn _it_.  
  
 _Damn it_. They were entirely and _completely_ in the middle of the desert with not a _hint_ of civilization around but PLENTY of Zechs’ soldiers. Once everyone that wasn’t shot down or blown up was off the plane, it was open season. Shin never cared for that metaphor but their plane was literally just _shot out of the sky_ by bastards that were murdering and torturing people for capitalistic gains. _Animals_ had more sense than that.  
  
It might have been minutes, it might have been hours or days. It was a contrived thought but frankly it was purely fact because it felt like they were shooting for a fucking unthinkable amount of time. Once they felled their last Zechs, with about thirty of their men dead aside from the seven blown up in the plane, they all stood there and looked at each other, out literally in the middle of the desert with an incinerated plane…but months worth of supplies.  
  
“Kitamura!!”  
  
Shin was so hot and dazed, he’d zoned out, just…not even… _capable_ of grasping this situation. To be honest, apparently a whole group of them were in the same boat but a particularly ornery bunch went to try to get the GPS and save it. Instead, they had a paper map. “We-We were able to record the coordinate showing on the global positioning, sir, but they’re…they’re not going to be able to track us. It went out.”  
  
Kitamura’s eyes widened. Shin stared. They couldn’t…track them…in the middle…of the desert.  
  
Shit.  
  
“…Keep…keep giving some orders, Yagami, since you’re so good at it” trembled Kitamura after a long moment.  
  
What now? Kitamura was the highest ranking one they had left now! Shin’s eyes narrowed before he shook his head, “…We…we need to compile the supplies. And we need to pick supplies off these Zechs’ bodies and get them buried to not attract attention from wildlife.”  
  
Oh no, _that_ got even the calmer ones. “W-Wildlife?!”  
  
Hundreds of guns and loads of ammunition were gathered from the Zechs’ soldiers along with the motherload of water. They needed it because this…this was not good.   
  
Komari came over to him as he rubbed his brow, staring at the map that had been retrieved. “…I know I was talking about a hot spring earlier but I’d take the showers in the base right now given we _know where that is_.”  
  
Shin swallowed, looking at the map, “…Prana.”  
  
“What?”  
  
“Prana. They…they call this stretch of desert Prana. Remember…remember when my friend Joe was saying this was where they were going to shuffle the Terrans through to get to that island? This…this is the land they’d cross.”

Komari stared at him, her eyes stretched, before she looked behind her. “…Oh my fuck, they were _serious_?”  
  
“Apparently.”  
  
“The…the nearest town?”  
  
“…About…three thousand miles?”  
  
“I beg _the fuck_ your pardon?”  
  
Shin grimaced as Komari glared at him, “Three _thousand_ miles? What about where we were _going_?”  
  
Surveying the map, locating the base, he grimaced, “…We’re not even on the same land yet.”  
  
“That’s just _swell_.”  
  
Looking around, Shin swallowed, “…Military law says that even abandoned bases need to keep transmission open. There’s an old base, they called it ‘Grimoire’ about 350 miles, 567 kilometers from here…”  
  
Komari stared at him. “…And how, _pray tell_ , are we going 350 miles?”  
  
“…Walking?”  
  
Scratching the side of her face, Komari shut her eyes, “…Shin. The…the average human can walk maybe twenty, thirty miles in the average day. In _optimal_ conditions. The temperature, at currently 2 o’clock in the day…is 129 degrees Fahrenheit, 54 Celsius. In sand. And you think…we can _walk_ 350 miles?”  
  
“It’d take eleven to seventeen days” he nodded.  
  
“Shin…” Komari said slowly, grabbing his shoulder, “ _Shin_. I know your last name makes you think you’re on some godly status, man, but if we attempted that, _we’d die_.”  
  
He shook his head, “Komari, if we _sit here_ , we’ll _die._ We’re absolute sitting _ducks_ , there is no _shelter_ aside from the crates of the supplies. We’re saying the nearest development known to _us_ is 350 miles from here—where’d hundreds of these guys even come from then? There are more of them and we can’t be caught here with our pants down.”  
  
Komari looked hesitant, glancing back over her shoulder, “…No one will walk this desert, Shin. Most protocol says stay near the wreckage so you can be found.”  
  
“Which makes sense in a car accident, Yamada, but if your car accident was in the middle of an active shooting, I think some protocol needs to be amended.”  
  
“…Propose it.”  
  
…Ugh. Shin rubbed his face, having put on goggles after the sand started to burn his eyes. It…was super damn hot, he probably wasn’t thinking straight. “…I’ll go.”  
  
“Come again?”  
  
“I’ll go. Kitamura won’t take that sort of proposal and it also would draw undue attention if a group went out anyway. I’ll go.”  
  
“Shut the _fuck up_ , you are not going to trek _350 miles_ across _scorching desert_ by _yourself_ ” Komari snapped.  
  
“What?”  
  
Oh great. Kitamura had wandered over, his face mostly covered. Great. “…There’s an old base, nicknamed ‘Grimoire’, about 350 miles, 567 kilometers from here. I understand all the risks and the difficulties, but I think we’re at a complete tactical disadvantage if we sit out here with no backup plan.”  
  
Kitamura scoffed, “…And what, you’re going to walk that, Yagami? That’d be stupid as shit. They’ll come find us and what? You’ll be trekking across the desert so no one can find you? Forget it.”  
  
It was a possibility. Komari’s brows were low as she drawled, “I hate to say it, Shin, but he’s right. We literally just crashed. When we don’t show up for the delivery, they’ll come looking for us per the flight plan. Don’t get me wrong, I get what you’re saying, but there are strength in numbers. We did a pretty solid job getting rid of these guys, I think we can manage a few days of it.”  
  
…His dad…would probably _die_ when they told him he was _MIA_.   
  
“…Ten days. If we haven’t been picked up in ten days then I’m going to head to the base.”  
  
“You can head out _now_ for all I care, Yagami” Kitamura rolled his eyes, “It’d just be dumb as shit.”  
  
Komari nodded, “I think ten days is a reasonable amount of time, Shin. But not a second before, okay? I think we’ll be okay.”  
  
…So much for home. And sleep.  
  
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 _Day 2. It was the common misconception that the desert was hot all the time. No, at night, it was bitter cold. Luckily they had their insulated sleeping bags but for those up on watch, it was pure misery. But…that was about it, it was hot as hell during the day, cold as a tundra at night. By Day 5, even he was convinced he had overreacted about the Zechs’ theat.  
  
Then Day 6 came.  
  
They came from the North, appearing to be the direction they were heading to deliver everything. They came in a big truck. They didn’t have Terrans but they sure had guns and the about two hundred men they had? Oh, every last one of them started shooting and throwing grenades.  
  
Honestly, it was the scariest fight yet. They were outnumbered with no coverage and no shelter. They couldn’t ALL hide behind wooden crates. It was all just…GRACE that he just got kind of roughed up instead of shot like another twenty of their group. The fight lasted for, no shit, twenty hours just because of stealth and other nonsense.   
  
Shin would have forgiven the whole thing because they left behind a vehicle…except the vehicle ended up incinerated. He and three other soldiers spent at least a day just pointlessly working to see if it could be revived. Nope…when the gas tank blew, that was…definitely the end of a truck, he now had firsthand experience.  
  
Unlike every movie situation though, he could say they weren’t running out of water. Every Zechs they killed had about three gallons on their person so that was around 600 gallons of water they were able to collect. They weren’t bathing in it, no, but…they were decent. And they were collecting ammo too? As far as being stranded in the desert went, it was…well, it was almost rosy if he didn’t take into consideration fifty percent of their platoon had been killed.  
  
Then came Round 3 on Day 9.  
  
It wasn’t two hundred Zechs’ this time but about a dozen of them came and they were pretty ruthless. They were LOOKING for their missing comrades…which made sense because three hundred people missing was kind of a lot and suspicious. But at least they came looking for their comrades because he’d not seen ONE plane overhead even indicating they were a thought to their army.   
  
“Well, well, what are you? A Jap or an American idiot?”   
  
Shin was soaked through with sweat, panting. Kitamura had run, hiding in a container, when one of the guys came up and tried to choke Shin out from behind. They were apparently not quite as stocked on ammo as their former comrades which was fine with Shin. Hand to hand? He was more than willing to fight for his life on equal footing.  
  
His mind though. His mind said that but it wasn’t accepting that he had to suffocate a person with his bare hands. He felt life literally ripping through his fingers as the man’s eyes bulged, gripping and squirming…_

 _Now? Now, he had someone else approaching him with a magnum pointed at his head.  
  
…This was beyond hell. Glancing to his side, Shin stared at the guy. White. This was literally a miscellaneous Caucasian man…fighting for WHAT?   
  
“…Take your pick. What are you?”  
  
“Norwegian.”  
  
Norwegian. Shin stared at him drearily, his arms heavy and not sure if he had any kill left in him. Alas, like the turmoil in his chest from strangling someone to death, he was confident and felt confirmed when a bullet whizzed through the man’s skull, tearing it apart.  
  
Grimacing as blood and brain matter splattered against his face, reminded that his dad’s career circled around repairing the very thing that was just obliterated, his ears ringing, Shin looked back at Komari who was holding the rifle. She was covered in bruises and blood, also hyperventilating. He read her lips, “You…you good, Y-Yagami?”  
  
“I’m…I’m something, Yamada. Is…is that all of them?”  
  
He glanced in time to see Kasumi snap a man’s neck, no small feat. She looked strained. “…That’s…that’s all of them.”  
  
And, once again, the transport they brought in was now a crispy stack of metal they could use for cover in the next fight! No. No more.  
  
Shin wiped his face, looking miserably to Komari who just silently looked back. It was about to be ten days. They’d been attacked three times and there was not one sign of rescue. He could have almost been to Grimoire by now.   
  
…No more_.

“Shin, this is stupid and crazy.”  
  
Yagami Shin knew he couldn’t possibly carry all the water he needed without tuckering himself out. Thing was, it’d be ridiculous to NOT carry water given he’d dehydrate and die quickly without it. He asked Kitamura, basically their now inventory keeper, for his segment of water and freeze-dried food.  
  
Kitamura was _smirking_. SMIRKING. He was sitting on the removed, burned seat of a car in the shade of the cargo box like he was on a fucking beach. “Sure, Yagami. What do you want me to tell them to tell your family when they pick us up?”  
  
“That they’ll find my bones in the desert and not sitting in a fucking chair, hoping to be found” Shin scoffed sarcastically.  
  
Others in the unit were whispering similar sentiments as Kitamura, that he was ‘crazy’ and they just needed to hold out a little longer. At this point, he was either going to die here or die out there. At least this gave him a damn chance. Komari didn’t seem on board.  
  
“Yagami, I will FIGHT you. Just wait a little longer!” Komari snapped as he layered bottle water and canteens in his bag.  
  
Hmm…the ammo probably needed to be in his side bag, he mused. “Shin. _Shin_. I am begging you, don’t do this.”  
  
Shin sighed deeply, slowly standing. It would be more intelligent to move at night. Yes, it was cold but he wouldn’t be perspiring near as much and some nights it was pitch black. He would also move in the day but he needed to optimize the former for maximum efficiency.  
  
“I’m really not going to talk you out of this, am I?”  
  
Looking at Komari, her face very irritated and sand burned, Shin grasped her shoulders. “…I’m going to get to that base, send a transmission, and they’ll save you, Komari. Until then, don’t be a hero and play it safe. This is the only way because we’re not going to survive another ten days out here. We’re not running out of supplies because there are less and less people to use them. This isn’t going to end favorably if someone doesn’t do something.”  
  
She silently watched him pick up his stuff, putting on one of the dead Zechs’ robes for added protection and covering his face with the cloth, putting on the goggles because the wind was whipping up the sand fiercely in the distance. Okay, here goes…reaching into his pocket, he pulled out the watch Lyla gave him which had a compass in the corner. Well, at…at least she was with him this much.  
  
“Wait.”  
  
When he looked back, he found Komari looked…annoyed. “Just…wait.”  
  
What? He frowned, watching her go over the Kitamura. As much as he trusted Komari, he honestly didn’t put it past her to ask Kitamura to stop him. About to move before that happened, he raised a brow when instead she grabbed a case of water bottles and about thirty dead Zechs’ canteens. What?  
  
Komari got food, ammo, guns…what was she doing? Taking a robe as well, she fashioned it around herself but why? What was she doing? Kasumi stared at her hard. Was she confused too?  
  
“…So you’re really going to choose him over me?”  
  
Eh? Shin stared, startled, as Komari gave Kasumi a dry look. “…No. I was hoping you’d be inspired to go with me.”  
  
“On a suicide mission? Forget it” Kasumi spat.  
  
Wait, who was going where? Suddenly, it clicked. “W-Wait, Komari…it’s…it’s too dangerous for you to go _too_. Stay here and protect the camp.”  
  
“Shut your hole, Yagami” she countered sharply, her eyes never leaving Kasumi, “…You know he’s right. You just don’t want to admit it because he’s a him. The Zechs are rolling in here and picking us off like petals on a daisy. We can’t even go in that direction because we’ll be outnumbered entirely _wherever_ they’re coming from. If I die out there, I did it trying to get help. Here, we are just pretending that they’re coming for us. They’re not. You know what they said. Seven days MIA and we’re _casualties_. Our whereabouts are _unknown_ and they’re not risking another a hundred people to come look for us. Please…just come with us.”  
  
“…Have fun. I’ll make sure they come looking for you” Kasumi said dully.  
  
Komari stared at her before tenderly giving her a kiss which apparently alarmed a lot of their remaining comrades. It alarmed _him_ because why was she coming with him?! Komari stroked Kasumi’s hair back, whispering, “Please…please don’t die, Sumi. No matter what happens.”  
  
And Komari turned, walking toward him, brisk. “Let’s go.”  
  
“…Okay.”  
  
Well…a friend and a half.  
  
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“…You sure this is the right way, Yagami?”  
  
“Yes.”  
  
Yagami Shin took a short sip of water as he sat on the ground with Yamada Komari. They traveled until about four in the morning last night. He slept for two hours while she kept watch then she slept for two hours while he kept watch and then they continued at eight. Now, at noon, they had stopped to nibble at field rations. Per his estimate, since they started at eight last night, they’d gone at least the twenty miles she deemed.   
  
It was marked by just little jot marks on the map but apparently there were oasis throughout the desert, just peculiar sections of lush growth which made absolutely no sense to him. However, he realized this…this may have been an example of Earthmate capabilities. Maybe. There was random water too which was refreshing. They couldn’t stay long because this definitely stood out like a sore thumb but it was a nice place to take a break.  
  
Komari was eating one of the sawdust rations they had, her eyes half-closed as she regarded him. Boy, was she not pleased with him right now. “How do you know?”  
  
Tipping his head, he murmured, “See that remnant of a statue in the distance?”  
  
She frowned, taking out her binoculars. It was easy to miss but it appeared to be a deeply submerged statue of a fox looking thing. From what he recalled of mythology, it was an Anubis. “…Are we anywhere _near_ Egypt?”  
  
“Well, closer than we are in Japan” Shin droned, “But they have it listed on the map as the ‘Bastet’ pointer.”  
  
“Bastet?”  
  
“I heard about it around the town we patrolled. There was this tribe of priests that migrated from Egypt to ‘work with the spirits of the Terrans’ in maintaining the land. I heard the Zechs’ massacred them back in the mid-90s and the priests’ families had to scatter. The Bastet Family. That statue is probably a remnant of their tribe or temple.”  
  
Komari looked…disturbed. “Shin, there is _nothing_ left except that statue. That was only six, seven years ago if it was the mid-90s. They just…wiped out all signs of the tribe?”  
  
“Appears so…”  
  
“…I hate these bastards.”  
  
He nodded miserably before staring at the map again. “…There’s a few of these ‘oasis’ between here and the base. About…three and then we’re just on flat land for the rest of the time unless there’s some unaccounted for. I want this to be our waypoint until they run out.”  
  
“You seem very oddly versed at being lost in the desert, Shin.”  
  
Shin smiled grimly, “…Lyla and I used to play ‘lost in the jungle’. That’s how we measured how to get back to our houses, the…flowers or something.”  
  
Flipping his watch open, looking at her picture, he bit his lip. It…it was looking good. If they kept this pace, if they kept under the radar, he…he should see her again. They could sort this out. He looked up to Komari who didn’t apparently have a picture of Kasumi, just idly nibbling on her food. Closing his watch, he murmured, “…I swear to you, Komari, that I’ll get you back to her, whatever it takes.”  
  
“…Don’t make promises you can’t keep, Yagami.”  
  
…Day 12.  
  
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 _Fuck_.  
  
Shin didn’t really mind sand so much. Yes, it was messy, it got everywhere, it was _hot_. But he loved digging his toes into it at the beach and the little crystals on his feet.  
  
He was turned inward, kneeling and blocking Komari with his body, occasionally having to stand so they wouldn’t be encapsulated, from a sandstorm. Nope…after this, it would take a good long time for him and sand to be on good terms again.  
  
“…Fuck this desert” Shin muttered under his breath.  
  
Fucking sand fleas. He had fucking sand fleas in his hair. If he knew that was going to happen, he would have shaved it off back at the crash site. Luckily they didn’t stay in his hair but they sure bit the fuck out of his scalp.   
  
Komari miserably dragged beside him after the wind let up, about five in the evening. It’d been around seven days and…well, they were getting close? But they were definitely slowing down with exhaustion from lack of sleep and heat. They’d hit all the oasis so now it was just desert. Desert and more desert. Just endless…endless desert.   
  
“Yagami.”  
  
“Hmm?”  
  
She was walking beside him as the sun started to set. By this point, they were too weary to take advantage of the cooler temperatures and the less oppressive sun hitting every square inch of their body, even with the covering. Nope, they were dragging. He might have to consider them just crashing for a full eight hours at this point because it’d be a damn shame to die of lack of sleep when everything else was trying to kill them.  
  
However, Komari looked…irritated. God, why did she come then?! “…Yagami, we can’t be out here past August.”  
  
“Um, _Komari_ , it’s _June._ If we’re out here past _August,_ it’s because our corpses are drying out.”  
  
She smirked at him, “It’s almost July, Shin. There stands a chance, if this doesn’t work, we might be out here past August. In which case, I’ll just have to stay behind.”  
  
“Why?”  
  
“Those predators we’ve managed to fight off and avoid? They’re going to pick up the scent of blood and my ‘heathen magic’ only lasts until August.”  
  
What now? Shin was about to ask why they were discussing blood when he had no intention of letting her get hurt. Nonetheless, it hit him and he ‘oh’d’. “…Well, I mean, we can…possibly fashion some feminine protection?”  
  
Snickering, she shook her head, “I start bleeding out of the wahoo out here, Shin, I am a thousand percent over it whether you can fashion ‘feminine protection’ or not. This just blows.”  
  
He found himself chuckling. Komari leered at him, “What?”  
  
“Sorry…I was just thinking about when my sister…got her monthly ‘blessing’ for the first time.”  
  
Komari raised a brow above her goggles as he gazed ahead, keeping his ear out, “…Jill is our only sister so, y’know, she’s in a house with a bunch of stupid dudes. Our mom wasn’t home…she was about eleven and just came out of her room, screaming, and we all flipped the hell out…”  
  
 _“It-it started. It started!!” Jill had sobbed.  
  
“What started?! What’s wrong?! Are you hurt?!” demanded fifteen-year-old Nelly, all of them having run to her when they heard the screams.  
  
“T-The adult thing!” she cried, “Th-The adult thing for women!! What do I do?!”  
  
Koji had been so flabbergasted. “Adult thing’?! You’re eleven!! There’s no adult thing!! Turn the adult thing back off!!”  
  
“I don’t know HOW TO!”  
  
_Shin smiled sadly, shaking his head. She was his…go-to back then. For a lot of things. He remembered running to call her and Marianne, the maid, advised that Lyla was busy. He begged for just a second and after a few minutes, she came to the phone. _“Shin? What’s the matter?”  
  
“Lyla, I need your help!”  
  
“What?? What’s the matter? Are you hurt?”  
  
“No, i-it’s Jill! Th-The thing that happens with women, it turned on too soon!”  
  
“What now?”  
  
“The- the thing wit-with the bleeding or whatever, it turned on for her too soon, how do we stop it?!”  
  
_He had been serious as a heart attack. He recalled how Lyla was dead silent for like thirty seconds before she apparently almost _died_ laughing. _“Lyla! This isn’t funny!!”  
  
“I-I’m sorry, Shin” she had choked, still cracking up, “I-I’ve just never heard you say anything so silly so seriously, yo-you just surprised me.”  
  
_Komari smirked widely, “So you thought a woman menstruating was like a faucet? Or a light switch? You just flip it on and off at your will?”  
  
Shin scoffed, “ _No_. We just thought…it came at a specific age very neatly and eleven was too soon so we wanted to make sure it waited until it was time.”  
  
Komari also laughed, drinking a bit of water, “Ya’ll were cute. What happened?”  
  
“Lyla…she came over and helped Jill before sitting us down and explaining…basic female health to us like the dummies we were” he groaned.  
  
“Shin, I promise you, there are more men at twenty or thirty unequipped with that knowledge than is acceptable so if you got it at sixteen, you were doing better than average.”  
  
“Maybe…” Shin murmured, “…I just don’t get it. She was there for me for so much when I needed her. We were…we were there for each other so what went wrong?”  
  
Komari shrugged, “…Let’s get to this base so you can find out.”  
  
…Right. Just…four more days to go if they kept this pace. Then, they could go home and he would see his family, apologize for worrying them.  
  
He would see her again and maybe…maybe they could get past the storm too.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
They were close. The next day, they should be at the base and he was almost ready to start running but he knew it’d wear him out. Komari was excited too.  
  
Then they found it.  
  
It was nighttime. The stars provided some light but it was hard to see. However, when they came to the metal structure, Komari was ecstatic. “Oh my God, Shin, we made it, we’re here.”  
  
Shin frowned. Kneeling low, he pulled out the map and…  
  
“…I know I am no navigator, Komari, but…there’s no way that’s the base.”  
  
“What?” she demanded quietly, crouching beside him.  
  
He showed her. They had passed another marker point on the map, an old sign that read ‘Octo’ for some reason or another. There was no way something that random would have moved either so the proximity of this being the base? No, it wasn’t it. Komari’s face scrunched before she looked up. “…It IS stupid as fuck to have a building made of dark metal out here. Plus, it’s very…small. So what is it then?”  
  
“…Should we investigate?” Shin mumbled, “That…that could be a Zechs’ base.”  
  
Komari scoffed, reaching for her bag, “You have my back, right?”  
  
“Of course.”  
  
“Then watch my back, I’ll snipe the Zechs, and maybe THEY have something we can use to get out of here” she grunted, assembling her sniper rifle.  
  
Well…this sounded crazy. “We’re in the fucking DESERT, Shin. ‘Crazy’ is all we have on the table right now.”  
  
…Okay. Their fatigues provided more camouflage than the robes so they took them off, army crawling toward the building. Once they cleared, he got back up and kept an outward look as Komari peered through random gaps in the structure.  
  
“…Oh my God” she whispered.  
  
Shin frowned, looking around, “What?”  
  
She grabbed his arm, sitting up and holding her gun and tipping her head. Shin got down to look…and fuck.  
  
In a tiny room, behind bars, was about a hundred or more Earthmates.   
  
Staring, Shin slowly pulled away, leaning against the structure because…what the FUCK?  
  
“Shin, what do we do?” Komari said softly.  
  
What…what do they DO? Shin slowly shook his head, “…Komari, we…we can’t leave them here. We can’t.”  
  
“Shin” she hissed, “We have JUST enough water to maybe last another week or two out here. And even if we were to bring them with us, there’s only two of us to protect them.”  
  
While he wanted to say they probably could at least protect themselves, he saw that there were children. They…gritting his teeth, he snarled, “Shit.”  
  
Grabbing a pen from his bag, he drew a circle and etched an ‘x’. “…We get to the base, we call for ourselves, then we tell them to come rescue them.”  
  
“We…we’re going to leave them then.”  
  
“…Do we have a real choice?” he murmured, “If we let them go, they might get gunned down out here or killed immediately. We don’t have…have the means.”  
  
Komari looked numb as they slowly crawled away, making sure the Zechs didn’t come around the corner to kill them. Granted, he wouldn’t have minded blowing them away because once again they managed to make him a monster. They…they were probably almost being cooked alive during the day in there if…if they were still alive to begin with.  
  
“Who the hell are you!?”  
  
Shin looked up, shocked, when two Zechs’ soldiers stood before them. Yea. Be careful what you asked for. One of them grabbed what looked like a horn…meaning they were about to notify their comrades who had to have been somewhere. But they weren’t…exactly here so…  
  
Without thinking, Shin rammed the guy to the ground, Komari wrangling the other down. Covering their mouths, he quickly surveyed the area. He didn’t see anyone but that didn’t mean ANYTHING. If they shot these guys, they might as well have let them sound the horn in this dead silence. Damn it. DAMN IT.   
  
“Yagami.”  
  
Forcing his knee further into the struggling soldier’s shoulders, Shin glared toward Komari who stared back, her face blank…as she pulled out her tactical knife. A knife? What was a knife--  
  
Shin felt his eyes grow, the realization ripping apart his insides. No, no…  
  
She shook her head before dragging the blade right through the soldier’s throat. Shin almost gagged at the gurgling of blood, the man’s screams underneath Komari’s hand. No. NO. That…  
  
The guy started thrashing, screaming into Shin’s hand as he slowly pulled his knife from his pocket. Maybe…maybe he was…he was begging for his life. Maybe he’d be willing to change after this. Maybe he didn’t…  
  
…Have…a choice…  
  
Shin clenched his eyes shut, jerking the man’s head back and cutting. Just like they were taught. Nice and quick. No…no room for error. He inhaled, choking on air, feeling the flesh tear and the blood seep against his skin as the man kicked violently. Pulling the knife in deeper, he pleaded. Die. Just…just, please, die already.  
  
“Shin?”  
  
No one came. They were probably the lookouts but they didn’t signal anything. Couldn’t. He shoved the bodies into a hole he dug while Komari kept watch. His…soul felt like it’d left his body and he was just an animated corpse digging up sand to bury another corpse in.  
  
“Shin.”  
  
He looked up when Komari touched his hand. Both of their hands were covered in blood. Komari looked…sad. “Shin, sweetie…I know that was rough but we need to get out of here, okay? The sooner we can get to the base, the sooner we can save those people. It won’t offset the lives we had to take but we need to move for those people AND ourselves now. Okay?”  
  
“…Yes.”  
  
Wiping his hands the best he could, they put the robes back on, like ghosts crossing into the darkness toward salvation. His head felt empty. In the distance, he thought he saw the sky start to fade to violet, just like more and more of his humanity started to bleed out.  
  
Just a monster with no choice. _  
  
_ XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

  
 _“Daddy?”  
  
In a place other than this, another desert void where the path was just as uncertain but he wasn’t coherent enough to notice, Shin might have been four, five years old. He’d just gotten his own room. He’d been so excited, thinking he was a ‘big kid’ now. Little did he know, having spent the first four, five years of his life sleeping beside his father, that being alone in a room meant you heard everything by yourself.  
  
He heard honking. He heard the gunshots like the one Uncle Jum’s gun made when they went shooting sometimes. Why was it so loud and outside though? He had wondered that, just so fucking innocent.  
  
One night, it got to be too much. He wanted out. He wanted to be back beside his dad in his arms, asleep, and not hearing all these things. So he trekked out of his room to his dad’s, prepared to request readmission to a safer place.  
  
His dad was…awake. His eyes were open but he was just kind of looking at Shin. Shin didn’t recall what he thought, just that it was weird. Nothing pressing, he just tried again. “Daddy?”  
  
“Y…Yes, Shin? W-What…what’s the…the matter?”  
  
“I’m scared. I-I want to sleep with you.”  
  
His father still didn’t move but he said shakily, “Oh…okay.”  
  
That had been all Shin needed to hear, scurrying over under the covers and getting close to Yagami Yamada. One thing he could remember even decades later was the fact his dad felt like he’d picked up a cube of ice, that biting cold in his palm, except it was the man’s entire body.  
  
“Papa, are you cold? You want me to get another blanket?”  
  
“I-I’m okay, baby. Don’t…don’t worry about me, okay? Just…just a bad…dream.”  
  
“You had a bad dream?”  
  
“Well…memory. I’ll warm up soon…”  
  
_Memory. Like…how his father watched almost a hundred dead bodies because one person did the wrong thing? Like that? Like how Shin had almost a hundred dead bodies to his name too now, including one where he had to cut their throat like an animal? PTSD. That was PTSD. This was PTSD.   
  
Shin sobbed in agony as he curled in the corner of the room, Komari also crying wretchedly as she kept crying into the phone ‘hello? Please, hello’.  
  
Yea. The plan was a bust.  
  
When they saw the base, it was like seeing the sun after months of rain. They both had actually laughed with joy and relief, running. After having slit someone open like a piece of fruit the night before, he was able to laugh…  
  
They entered the base cautiously, uncertain if the Zechs had repurposed it. They did a thorough search, finding it completely abandoned and rusted out. So, eager, they ran into the communication room, where army protocol said they were supposed to leave the line _active_ and picked up the phone in the corner.  
  
Nothing. No dial tone, nothing.  
  
Okay, they stayed calm. There were ten other phones in this room. So they went and got each of them, plugging them into the line that was usually the hot one. Nothing.  
  
Growing uneasy but still hopeful, they tried…all the lines in the room.  
  
Nothing.

That anguish he felt…when he was heartbroken over Lyla’s complicit silence? He thought that…that was pain. When they were left standing there in that room with the gravity of truth, he actually wished it had been his throat that was cut it hurt so bad.  
  
God, papa. Papa. His papa _begged_ and _pleaded_ he didn’t do this. He begged that Shin _come home_. After all his dad _did for him_. After all his _mama_ did for him. His mama was _waiting for him_. He spent his childhood waiting for her and she _always came back_. Why? _Why_?  
  
His siblings—he’d never speak to them again? He wouldn’t see…he wouldn’t see them grow up? Have families? Live? He wouldn’t get to goof off with his brothers and sister? Fret over her? Send her flowers and presents because she was special? All of it was _over?  
  
“…Lyla_” he wept, huge tears rolling down his face, “God, _Lyla.”  
  
_ He hadn’t seen her in _two years._ Why didn’t he go after her in the airport? Lyla had _never let him down, why_ —why did he give up that easily? _Why_? He’d never _see her again_.  
  
They sat there for hours, mourning, and eventually they just…fell asleep. It didn’t even matter to have a watcher. At first.  
  
 _“Kill him and save the girl. I haven’t seen pussy in months, we can have a little fun.”  
  
_ Shin felt a gun pointed at him and, had it just stayed at ‘kill him’, he honestly might have let them in that moment. The other part though…? No. He…he couldn’t stand to allow that to happen, no matter what.  
  
Opening his eyes, he ended up shooting the guy in the crotch from the angle he was in but quickly headshot him to end his misery. The two near Komari looked shocked as he shot them through the head next. Just like his father, she was awake, motionless, just staring at him.  
  
“…What’s left to fight for, Shin?”  
  
Getting to his feet, he carefully walked over to the door, checking the corners. No one…where’d these assholes come from? “…Honestly, Yamada? I’m only fighting for you right now at this second.”  
  
“Stop then.”  
  
“Nah.”  
  
She sat up, glaring at him, as he took the rifles off of the bodies. “They probably cut the lines, Komari. I wouldn’t be surprised if we weren’t the first to try to get to this base.”  
  
Komari was disinterested as he opened the map on the table. “Today, it’s July 2nd. If-If we keep walking, we can make it to the coast by August 20th or so.”  
  
“You are really pissing me off right now, Yagami. That’s…what? Roughly…2,750 miles from here? That sounds…plausible for us to walk to you?”  
  
Shin glowered, “Then what do you propose?”  
  
“I propose we just sit here and die because that’s what Sumi and the others have probably done by now if they weren’t rescued” she snapped.  
  
In all honesty, the frustration was at an absolute pinnacle and he felt it too. He wanted to bark back something but the fact of the matter? “You’re right.”  
  
Komari leered at him as he sat up straighter, “…At this point? We’re just prolonging the inevitable. We’re gonna get caught. Probably tortured and killed too. The other possibility is we die of dehydration or starvation. Or our bodies overheat. There’s nothing in this situation that isn’t trying to kill us.”  
  
“I taste that ‘however’, Yagami, and it’s burning me up.”  
  
“ _However_ …what the hell, right?”  
  
Komari’s eyes widened as he shrugged absently, “…Got nothing better to do now, right? Yea, we can sit here and let ourselves get shot but…endgame is looking like we die so we can either die in a blaze of glory or die sitting inside of an abandoned box.”  
  
“…A fairly _comfortable_ abandoned box.”  
  
“You’re the only one that has stuck with me, Komari, so it’s whatever you want. I…I owe it to you.”  
  
She seethed loudly, rubbing her face. They were burnt. Their hair was burnt too, almost blond at this point. He was covered in bruises, cuts, and calluses. Due to the food rationing, he may have been at peak movement but he was losing weight. The damn _phones hadn’t worked._ They were whooped.  
  
Just…maybe that event tortured his dad. Maybe…maybe it woke him up at night, paralyzed and cold. But he hadn’t given in once.

Maybe Shin still felt the writhing of that human being as he cut his throat in his fingertips. Maybe he wasn’t sleeping because someone might kill him when he least expected. Maybe he should let them.

He just…couldn’t give up yet.  
  
“…All right, Shin. I will go along with you for this suicide mission until I or you die” she spat, standing. “It’s useless. This is all useless.”  
  
“Great. Let’s rummage.”  
  
Looking at him with disbelief as he headed for the mess hall, Komari grumbled about his ‘crazy ass’. Yea, maybe.   
  
…There were a few boxes of food left which was great. Even Komari kind of perked up when they found water was still getting tapped somehow through one of the faucets. Washing off the blood and sweat and other general filth was the most rejuvenating thing he’d felt in a long time. Komari started a fire and started to boil the water before filtering it into their empty canteens while he went around the perimeter to scout the outside.  
  
About five Zechs were outside, confusingly not coming to check for their dead comrades. While Shin wasn’t the sniper, he knew a little bit. With Komari, they just absently finished them off. He ran out, took their water, guns, and food and ran back in. Like a fucking scavenger.

Komari stared at him emptily as they went out the back door, probably wondering what insanity made him ready to go across thousands of miles of desert.  
  
…His dad could have given up. He didn’t. Like…Like Koji said, best to…knock on wood and hope for the best until it was no longer provided. He wanted to…but he couldn’t give up until there was nothing left.   
  
When they went out, he was startled. A…a truck. Holy shit, a _truck_. He looked to Komari who looked surprised too.   
  
Surveying the vehicle, making sure there weren’t any explosives or anything, he was shocked to find a full two containers of gas in the back too. “We…we may be able to get about five hundred miles with this.”  
  
“…Huh. Yagami…our luck might _have_ turned.”  
  
Loading their things, he climbed into the driver’s seat after they put the robes back on. A little…undercover, he supposed. Komari leaned back, yawning, “…This is still nuts, Shin.”  
  
“You’ll make it to that hot spring yet, Komari.”  
  
She smiled wistfully as he started the truck, the first time he’d driven in a long, long time. He absently held out his hand, knowing she’d reject it. “…Trust me this once, Yamada, and I promise…I will never have us go across a desert again.”  
  
Komari laughed. It…was nice they could still be anything other than miserable. She gripped his hand though. “Yagami…you get us anywhere but dead, I’ll follow you to Hell.”  
  
…Hang on, papa. This Shin…wasn’t going to be a cold memory.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
“They had _crazy_ taste in music. These band names alone would have turned me away.”  
  
Yagami Shin glared incredulously as he lied back in the passenger seat of the car, having grown weary so Komari took over. He located that the Zechs had kept cassettes in the car but it was literally like… “…Assholeparade? ‘Bastard Sons of Johnny Cash’? ‘Breaking Benjamin’?”  
  
“You some kind of music snob there, Yagami?”  
  
“Oh yea” he droned, popping in one of the cassettes, “My brothers and I, this was like…our big deal in life. We went to the music store almost every other day, concerts—I…I’ll miss it if we don’t make it back.”  
  
Komari didn’t say anything before drawling, “…Your family is really close.”  
  
“Yea. We’re…all we have.”  
  
She yawned softly, “You never mention anything extended, really. Y’know, aunts, uncles, grandpa, grandma…”  
  
Shaking his head, he replied, “Of course they exist but don’t know them.”  
  
Komari glanced at him, seeming confused, before looking back at the open terrain before them. “…Kind of unusual.”  
  
“Yea.”  
  
She smirked. Hmm? “Yagami, one or both of us are probably not going to make it out of here so you can cut the secretive shit.”  
  
“Well, I don’t quite accept that prognosis just yet.”  
  
“Fine-e-e, just keep your deep dark secrets.”  
  
Shin snickered, looking at his hands. He found himself doing that a lot lately, especially when he recalled that after his first deployment he was upset over less than twenty people losing their lives to him. Now? Now, he…he was actually starting to lose count. He had strangled someone and cut someone’s throat.  
  
…Maybe Komari was right. “…We do get out, promise you won’t tell anyone?”  
  
“Snitches get stitches.”  
  
“I’m serious” he smiled.  
  
“Sure. Might even tell you a story or two as long as yours isn’t some crap story about how much money your parents have so they cut your grandparents off.”  
  
Shin snorted, “Tuh. Hardly.”  
  
He stared at the roof of the Jeep, a little…perturbed. He’d only ever told _her_ outside of his family anything about this. He hadn’t even told her all of it. Just… “I don’t know every detail, right? My parents met when they were crazy young—think my dad was like freshly 17 and my mom was 14. My dad, he was the product of his Japanese mom sleeping with an American politician when she was a teenager too. He went back home to his family and she ended up raising my dad on her own. My dad felt obligated to her so he worked like three jobs to help her since he was like ten.”  
  
“My mom, on the other hand, she…was from this old rich family. They were around since like…Sengoku Period. I _think_ she had two sisters and a brother and both of her parents. She…she was engaged real young to this son of a bitch bastard from another rich family. Somehow, she ended up meeting my dad and they…they fell in love, I guess.”  
  
“Well, sounding right typical right now…” Komari remarked.  
  
Nodding, Shin yawned, “Well…it gets less typical. My dad? He had a best friend, his name was Shin.”  
  
“That must be confusing…”  
  
Nope. “Yea…so, this best friend? He dealt cocaine for the yakuza. He also was stealing cocaine and money from the yakuza.”  
  
“…That…kind of escalated rather quickly there, Yagami” Komari said slowly, “Okay. So, best friend with your name was a drug dealer for the Japanese mob, gotcha.”  
  
Shin cracked his knuckles, nodding, “Not…a hundred on how my dad got involved but apparently someone reached out to him, said, ‘yea, your best friend is stealing from the mob. If you don’t want him to die, start paying the difference’.”  
  
“…Huh.”  
  
“Yea. So my dad, he worked odd jobs and started taking money out of his paycheck to pay the difference.”  
  
She made a face, “…Your dad is a real good one then. I wouldn’t even do that for _Kasumi_ and you see what I’ll do for her.”  
  
Seriously. “I…guess there was some missing parts for me there but he did it for a good long while. While that was going on, he was working as a medical assistant and got into college. Meanwhile, my mom…she was slowly being prepared to marry that son of a bitch fiancé at sixteen. In the midst of that, she found out she was pregnant…with me.”  
  
“Guess the fiancé wasn’t too happy…”  
  
… “Well…maybe. Doesn’t matter. The intention was he wasn’t going to know. My… ‘grandmother’, or, my mom’s mom, she was going to force my mother to abort me.”  
  
“…Okay, wow.”  
  
“Obviously, didn’t _happen_ , but my mom, she…she knew she couldn’t stay in her family home but they had her guarded and surrounded so she cut the flooring out in her room, shimmied underneath the foundation, and made her way out in the mud and rain to escape.”  
  
“…Okay, _wow_.”  
  
“She…I think it was described to me somewhere that she was fearful for my dad so she intended to leave the island all together but my dad, he found her, and brought her back to Wasaba. His mom, I…met her a few times but nothing solid. She was mad my dad took responsibility for my mom and me, so she kicked him out and he moved my mom to the better side and they got married. I think everything was going fine…until Shin. He was strung out on the cocaine he was dealing and my dad, he was…well, he was a spouse now, right? He had other responsibilities.”  
  
“Right…”  
  
“So, my dad cut ties somehow with the situation and told Shin what had been going on, that the yakuza were on to him all along and he needed to get right. It…didn’t quite work out. That Shin, he got shot like…twelve times because they finally caught up with him.”  
  
“…Shit.”  
  
“…I’ve only learned this part myself recently. The yakuza…the yakuza that Shin was under, it was my mom’s fiancé. When Shin’s life was on the line, apparently…he told my mom’s fiancé how to find my mom.”  
  
Shin felt Komari about put on the brakes. Oops. “… _What_?”  
  
Grimacing, Shin shrugged as Komari stared at him _hard_. “…Your dad…kept him alive…by paying for his _pettiness_ in _drug dealing_ …and he tells your mom’s yakuza fiancé how to _find her_?”  
  
“Yes.”  
  
“…Woohoo” Komari whistled, shaking her head as she resumed normal acceleration, “Let me tell you, man: me and the hubs would have definitely been picking out some new baby names.”  
  
He wondered about that a lot too… “I guess it was too short notice. Her parents showed up, told her that her ‘fiance’ was willing to take her back and must’ve blackmailed my dad somehow. So, she ended up going to marry that bastard.”  
  
“Wow. I really do not like this story” Komari said in an almost amazed tone.  
  
It…wasn’t great. “Yea, I can stop because, I promise, it gets worse.”  
  
Komari shook her head. “…I’m in too deep now. Continue.”  
  
“My mom, she ended up leaving me solely in my dad’s care. He watched me and brought dead Shin’s sister in as my nanny. I don’t know all the logistics, but, my mom was able to see my dad for her birthday. I heard she…had to get beaten by her husband to do so.”  
  
“…Oh. My. God.”  
  
“Anyway, that’s…how my twin brothers, Koji and Nelly, were born. Then some years down the line, they also managed to have my little brother, Tony, and baby sister, Jill.”  
  
Shin paused. Komari stared ahead before looking to him again, “…This is the dark part.”  
  
“Yea.”  
  
Clearing his throat, he sat up and looked out. It’d be nice if there was…something other than sand to look at. “…I saw them on and off throughout the years, my brothers. I actually didn’t get to meet the younger twins until my…dad had. They were already like, five, six months old. Anyway, my…my brother, Koji, he…he was always this kind of…dour kid. Like, we’d play together normally but as time passed, he just got…”  
  
Swallowing hard, remembering Koji growing more and more distant, Shin whispered, “…He was sick. Nelly escaped the fiance’s home with him and the babies and went to my dad’s hospital. My dad saw them and…he had Koji examined. They…they found that…that he’d been…getting raped. By a man.”  
  
“…The fucking stepdad.”  
  
“Yea.”  
  
“I hope his sick ass is rotting in prison then” snarled Komari, her eyes narrowed, “People are so disgusting, I can’t stand it sometimes.”  
  
“Yes.”  
  
“But…it sounds like your brother is doing good though despite all that. I mean, a wild streak is to be expected with that kind of foundation but it sounds like he’s pretty sane in the circumstances” Komari smiled.  
  
…Mm. “…Yea, about that…”  
  
“What?”  
  
“…He doesn’t remember anything. He…he was seen by a doctor that kind of…repressed everything. So, if…he his subconscious tries to kick in, his mind just blacks it out and he’s not quite sure what’s going on.”  
  
Komari was dead silent on that. Yea.  
  
“…Shin, do you…think that’s fair? I mean, like…I get it, a lot of people would _love_ to live without trauma but like…it sounds like everyone else in the family knows and, like…he can’t be completely okay, even not knowing.”  
  
Shin shook his head, “…He’s got an angry violent streak a mile long and goes through random bouts of depressions he can’t rationalize. It…it wasn’t my choice and I’m…I’m just afraid what will happen if I told him.”  
  
“…Fuck.”  
  
“But yea…that’s why it’s only us.”  
  
 _There’s no place like home. There’s no place like home. There’s a little white porch and you wanted it so. Can you let me go down to the end of the road?  
  
_ “…I’m an only child. I don’t really get…sibling stuff, I guess. I mean, sure, the kids around us were like my little siblings but like…nothing like what you have going on” Komari explained softly.  
  
“…I bet your parents are looking for you to come back too though, Komari. Their only beloved child?”  
  
“Yea. I guess…it’s only right that we give it our best until the end, right? No…no matter what it takes.”  
  
 _What I want from this world, what I wanna resolve. When I want you to stay; so I want you to wait. I don't wanna be bold. I don't wanna be cold. I don't wanna grow old…I wanna go home._  
  
Staring at the radio, a little surprised that it wasn’t…the worst thing he’d heard, considering it was from the collection of some genocidal maniacs, Shin nodded. “…I want us to go home, Komari. Whatever it takes.”  
  
…He guessed…one more son could be robbed of their sanity if that’s what it took.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
“…Gotta say, the ol’ girl carried us quite a ways.”  
  
Shin dug with a shovel that was in the back of the truck a fairly large hole. They weren’t leaving any evidence trails and it’d probably look suspicious, a random truck out in the middle of nowhere.   
  
Komari dug on the other side, having made the remark that was true, just unfortunately in the past tense. They drove for about two days straight, eventually just taking turns and going to sleep while the other person drove. It went two hundred miles over expectation, about seven hundred miles further than they had been. It never overheated despite it definitely having ample opportunity to, it had suck A/C but suck A/C was better than this scorching oppression, and he wasn’t really prepared to say it was dead…it was just out of gas and probably other critical fluids.  
  
Putting it in neutral when he engaged the lock with the key, he and Komari pushed their loyal ‘stead’ into the ground, putting a bit of sand back but, frankly, the desert would do that for them eventually.   
  
He sat down and looked at the map grimly, Komari sitting beside him. She shook her head as he couldn’t take his eyes off the x’s.  
  
…To have thought it was only one was a naïve mistake. Why on Earth would _one_ atrocity do? No, they were both so…innocently shocked that, some hours into their drive, they came across another metal building. The Zechs were actively outside of that one so it was clear they had the same scenario as the last one. They didn’t stop because it’d have looked suspicious, at ease driving amongst other Zechs before disappearing further into the desert. Komari quietly circled an x on their map.  
  
After two days, they had approximately seven additional x’s on their map.   
  
Shin breathed out, muttering, “…What was the scope, Komari? What they told my friend, Joe…is this…is this that plan in fruition?”  
  
Rubbing her chin, Komari raised a brow, “…You spread a rumor that they’re going to Fenith. Means they _know_ about Fenith and it’s importance to the Terrans. Saying that ‘we’re going to go attack Fenith’ or ‘we’re taking these Earthmates to Fenith after trekking them through Prana’, where does our attention go?”  
  
“…To Fenith. To protecting the water” Shin rasped.  
  
“Meanwhile, they can pull all their shit here in the middle of nowhere. The base we had here hasn’t been occupied in almost ten years—we have no stronghold here and we’re not looking. We’re only flying over it…maybe?”  
  
Shin winced, staring at the map again, “…That’s why we got shot down. I bet they thought we were getting closer to finding them out.”  
  
“That…” Komari whispered, “…Or our pilot took creative liberties with our flight plan. Which is why the army never came, we weren’t on the same route.”  
  
“Swell.”  
  
“Well…I’m ready when you are. Just…two thousand miles to go. On foot.”  
  
Shin stared into the distance. The heat was so thick, the air was waving. That…purple fade again. “…I’m traumatized by all the killing we’ve done, Komari. However, if we come across another truck…”  
  
With a snicker, she stood up, “Bro, we come across three more trucks, we _made it_.”  
  
Unlikely. It was no man’s land at this point, there weren’t even pointers on the map anymore, just…space. However, those two days of driving, he felt a bit more rested, his legs were aching but they were probably ready to start trekking again, and they hadn’t been perspiring near as much so water supplies were good. He…he was feeling confident again.  
  
That first day anyway.  
  
It was…120 degrees Fahrenheit. 49 degrees Celsius. That meant the UV index because of the sand was _deadly_ and he could feel the moisture getting sucked out of his skin. He struggled to take only a sip of water every hundred steps, his body was _begging_ him for more. Komari was panting, dragging behind. Yea…he was an optimistic full on…dumbass.  
  
“We can’t do it, Shin.”  
  
Shin had stopped to throw up, the most dangerous thing he could do in this situation as he robbed his body of the probably scarce amount of electrolytes he had if any. Komari was sitting on the ground, the sweat dripping off of her like a stream. She looked…weak. “We…we just can’t, Shin. We just can’t.”  
  
Taking a longer drink of water, the bile still heavy, he shook his head. “…Wh-What do you want to do, Komari?”  
  
“I want you to _give up_. If _you_ give up, _I_ can give up. As long as you’re still full of _fight_ , I feel like _I_ need to be full of fight.”  
  
He lied on his back in the sun, his clothes keeping his back from burning, covering his eyes with his forearm. “…Sorry, ‘Mari, I’m…I’m not sure I can do that. If…if they come for us, jus…just lemme get shot for that tuh happen…”  
  
“Boy, will I.”  
  
How depressing. Shin struggled to his feet, picking up his supplies, as Komari did the same and they just…continued along.   
  
Komari fell asleep so hard when the sun completely went down. It was probably uncomfortably cold to the average person but after hours of overheating, it felt almost… _orgasmic_ if he wanted to go that direction to have the temperature drop and they could rest. Somewhat.  
  
“This is because you’re a halfbreed.”  
  
Shin stared at Lieutenant Sato, leaning back against his stuff, holding his gun. “…Oh really?”  
  
“You’re all just so fucking stuck on survival. Have to prove something. Meanwhile, you cause all around you to suffer because you just don’t know when to die. Miserable piece of shit.”  
  
At this point, Shin wasn’t sure he was wrong, blinking as Sato walked away in a huff. Grabbing the map, his only ‘reading material’, he looked at their destination and how far they were from it. Turning it over, he scribbled in the margin: July 7th, 2002, Day 27. They’d been missing for almost a month. His dad thought he was dead.  
  
“Shin…get some sleep.”  
  
Komari woke up after three hours, sitting up and eating one of the ration bars. Shin was trying to fight it, weary. His head rested on the bag, he said drearily, “Can’t, said you’ll let me die…”  
  
“Aww, shaddup, Yagami” Komari snorted, stroking his eyes shut, “Carry your ass to sleep.”  
  
He couldn’t. They tried to kill him and plotted to rape Komari in his sleep. Even if she wasn’t going to protect him anymore, he…he had to protect them both. Still, his body didn’t care about those concerns, he did doze off…to have dreams about dragging his tactical knife across some miscellaneous person’s jugular while in the eye room in Sharance, Sato barking at him for being so weak in the mind while Okamoto Bajiru belittled his existence some more. It…wasn’t actually sleep, just a state of slight unconsciousness.

Opening his eyes, feeling nauseous again just because of the exhaustion, he sat up. It…it was still cool. “Let’s…let’s walk some more, Komari.”  
  
She was staring up at the sky, not saying anything, before she nodded. He wondered what she saw.   
  
“Shin, do you love her?”  
  
Day 32.  
  
He glanced to his side, Lyla wandering beside him. She was wearing that yellow sundress she wore to the Nirvana concert. Her face was down and he was confused. Love who?  
  
“Her. Komari.”  
  
Komari was dragging behind him. They hadn’t talked in about a day because, well, she got irritated again. She was done and he didn’t have it in him to be done. He barked that she was supposed to have his back and she snapped that she didn’t want to anymore.  
  
Fine. He understood why, just… did he love her? Maybe a little, Lai, but it wasn’t romantic. I don’t know how to be alone and she’s…she’s supported me. Like you did.  
  
“Shin, do you hear that?”  
  
“Then why’d you leave me?” Lyla asked.  
  
I…didn’t mean to. Shin bit his lip. He just was angry. ‘I was so angry with you.’  
  
“Shin? Dude, am I hearing things?”  
  
“Now…you’ll never see me again. You’ll die alone.”  
  
…But…  
  
“Shin!!”  
  
Shin jerked, shocked as Komari screeched. What? He looked up in time to see a Zechs soldier on a dune buggy pointing some kind of gun at him. Shit.  
  
A gunshot traveled fast. _Fast._ But everything fell into slow motion and Komari tried to jump in front of him. Tried, but there was…was no way. He grabbed her around her waist and threw them to the ground. But bullets were fast. Three of the bullets ripped through her lower left leg.  
  
“ _No!!_ ” he shrieked.  
  
Komari sobbed, writhing and tossing back and forth, gripping her leg. _Shit!!_ Enraged, blindly, not worried about his breathing but robbing the breath of that son of a bitch, he whipped a gun out of his pocket and shot the bastard through the forehead in one fluid motion.  
  
The monster fell off his bike, crumbling to the ground and the dune buggy spiraling a few feet forward before coming to a stop. Shin surveyed quickly and saw another truck, yelling and starting to shoot at them. Shin changed out with their rifle and before they started shooting, shot straight through the windshield. Grabbing his handgun again, he ran toward the truck and snatched the door open. Apparently he was still high on the gun aptitude scale, both of them had fatal bullet wounds, the driver’s foot stuck on the gas. He threw him out, putting the vehicle in park.   
  
Running, stumbling, back to Komari, he found her quivering, blood seeping out of her leg. God. God. “Fuck…” he choked, “Fuck. Komari, I-I’m so sorry, it’s-it’s all my fault, fuck.”  
  
“You couldn’t even let me die…” she said wearily.  
  
He shook his head, picking her up in his arms and setting her in the truck as fast as possible. Doing a quick check for explosives, he grabbed their things, the water bottles off the bodies…  
  
Ugh. Quickly looking around, praying no one else popped up, he dug a haphazard hole and pushed the corpses in it, sloppily covering them. He’d…he’d run them over with the truck to compact it down.   
  
Rolling the dune buggy, he managed to tie it up in the miniscule trunk and jumped into the driver’s seat, gunning up the sand as fast as he could. Komari was breathing erratically as he rolled full speed forward. He had to get her to safety first.   
  
About ten minutes into going about eighty every second, not wanting to burn the motor up, he came to a stop and rushed over to her. Throwing out his sleeping bag, he stretched her across it on her stomach and built a tent around her leg. This…was at least top ten on least sterile environments.   
  
Grabbing the water bottle he lifted off those assholes, he gave her one, “Drink.”  
  
“Shin.”  
  
“ _Drink_.”  
  
She complied, taking soft sips as he grabbed another and surveyed her leg. The bullet wounds were _huge,_ it had to have damaged a ligament or muscle tissue. Well…he didn’t have to remove them, they went right through. Cursing himself, he seethed and covered his face. Fuck. _Fuck_.

“Shin, it’s okay.”  
  
No, it _wasn’t_. She wasn’t losing _her mind_ and when he was busy arguing with _ghosts_ , his only living companion sacrificed herself for him. Now? Now she might _bleed out_ out here.  
  
Gritting his teeth, Shin grabbed the first aid kit. He had alcohol. About…three bottles. He’d have to dilute it to make it last. Taking out gauze and wrap, he awkwardly reached into his pocket and grabbed a lighter. Well…this…journey definitely took care of his nicotine habit. “I…I’m going to cauterize the wounds, Komari, they’re…they’re a little bigger than golf balls and you’re going to bleed out.”  
  
“Whatever.”  
  
Only her. He gave her a cloth to bite down on while he grabbed the knife he hadn’t used to cut someone’s jugular and ran his lighter across it until it was burning hot. He’d…rather be in Hell right now.  
  
Komari clenched her eyes shut tight, gnashing her teeth, as he pressed the burning metal to her skin. Yea. He…should have become a doctor, wow. He was trying to save people _here_ too and it wasn’t working out, he definitely could have done this in a hospital instead.  
  
Waiting for her flesh to cool off, he tenderly as possible cleaned everything with alcohol. After, he stared. He…could slightly see _through_ her leg. Gripping his head again, he shivered. This…this was all his fault.  
  
She just looked at him absently as he packed her wound with iodoform strips then wrapped the wound with a once around of gauze and completely with bandage. Definitely had to keep sand out. Rummaging through the bag, he found a couple packets of ibuprofen. A laugh on the scale of pain relief, but…it should keep her from having a fever. Giving it to her, she took it, still staring, probably thinking what a dumb fuck he was.  
  
Putting her back in the truck, he kissed her forehead. “…I’m sorry, Yamada. I’m going to make this right.”  
  
When she said nothing, he packed up and climbed into the driver seat. Same scenario as last truck except this time he had a dune buggy too. Putting the truck into gear, he glared as Sato stood outside the window, scoffing, “You deserve to be alone, you piece of shit.”  
  
Maybe. Just maybe. But now, he’d die before she did. He started this. Looking over to her, finding she’d gone to sleep, he nodded once and drove away from Sato, Bajiru, and Lyla. He wasn’t going to finish it alone.  
  
He owed her his life now forever.  
  
XXXXXXXXXX  
  
It was sketchy. The truck seemed _way_ less dependable than the last one so he was pretty sure it wouldn’t make it the same seven hundred miles. No, it surprised him, it went 750. With him alone, _having_ to stop sometimes to sleep for at least an hour or two, it took about four days using all the gas.  
  
Komari didn’t speak to him. At all. She shouldn’t. He was so busy tripping out he let her get injured. He was talking to ghosts when he should have been focused on getting to the real thing. He didn’t press it with the victim of his insanity, just stopping every four hours to clean her wound and repack it when necessary. It wasn’t…infected, but it was not looking good. No signs of gangrene, at least, just…  
  
Checking off two more x’s, having come across two more Terran camps some miles back, Shin wiped his brow. This…

“I’m done, Shin.”  
  
He had given her some privacy when she went to urinate. Before her injury, they lingered during those times but it was such a weird thing to have to watch someone do. Komari still managed to do it with one leg, dragging herself with a makeshift crutch he made out of a bar the Zechs had in the back of the truck. After burying the truck, he sat on the back of the dune buggy. It had a smaller gas tank. At most it’d get them maybe two hundred miles and that was being optimistic. He brought the rope, bungee cords, and seat belts with him in his far lighter bag. If…some miracle didn’t happen in the next two hundred miles…  
  
Komari stared at him as he hedged her to get on the back. “C’mon, we can make some good time since the sun is setting.”  
  
“Shin.”  
  
“Come on, Komari.”  
  
She just climbed onto the back and gripped his waist as he twisted the gears and rolled along. He was…fatigued, famished, and forlorn. This…this was taking everything from him.  
  
“…You look funny with facial hair.”  
  
Shin lied beside Komari, having stopped for her wound check and a break to eat their lessening food. He would only take a nibble and save the rest. In something he failed to notice, he hadn’t really looked at himself in a month. He had caught a glimpse in the rearview mirror but didn’t spend much thought. But no, as he buried the truck, he saw himself in the sideview and almost freaked out because someone might be behind him.  
  
His face…was drawn. Gaunt. Worn. He was burnt, brown. His hair was light at the crown and to his shoulders in length and he had above a five o’clock shadow. He didn’t…  
  
…He didn’t know who that was.  
  
“…I have to shave, like, maybe once every few weeks at home. I guess this is a month of progress.”  
  
Komari looked about the same. Also extremely tanned and with her hair sun-distressed and a bit shaggier. They were dehydrated, their skin was tight. She…she was flushed possibly with infection. Ugh. This…  
  
“How’s your shoulder?”  
  
“Mm. It’s fine.”  
  
In the adrenaline of it all, he didn’t even realize he’d been shot in the shoulder twice by the bastards in the truck. Smaller bullet than what hit Komari, thankfully, but he’d had the honor of having been shot six times now. Considering though? That…that was actually phenomenal.  
  
After lying around until about two in the afternoon per Lyla’s watch, he settled Komari in front of him on the bike. It was more cumbersome but she needed to take the least amount of sun in her condition. She had fallen quiet again, apparently asleep against his chest. Hang…hang in there.  
  
If he wanted to deem anything a miracle, it was the fact that after an additional three days, the buggy lasted 300 miles before sputtering out. Komari stared as he smiled grimly. Just…900ish miles to go.  
  
Honestly, if they just got a hold of _one more truck_ , it’d be…it’d be fantastic. But this? He thought they were in no man’s land before, there was _nothing_ out here. They hadn’t even crossed a camp in hundreds of miles. It was too oppressive out here, not even those genocidal maniacs would subject themselves to this. If he came across a Zechs in a truck this far out, they were nuts and he wasn’t assured he could even fight that level of crazy, even with his shattered sanity.  
  
“Whatcha gonna do now, hafu?” Sato crouched, smiling up at him.  
  
Ignoring him, Shin settled Komari on the ground on his sleeping bag and took the ropes out of his bag. Well, first, bury the dune buggy…even if the Zechs weren’t out here, it was too risky to leave evidence.   
  
While he was digging a hole, Komari stared at him sleepily. “…That for me too?”  
  
“Is what for you?”  
  
“The hole.”  
  
“What?”  
  
“The hole. Are you digging one for me too?” Komari said faintly, her voice scratchy.  
  
Shin glowered back at her, “What the hell are you talking about? You’re not dying.”  
  
“You’re a real stone-cold bastard, Yagami.”  
  
“I guess.”  
  
What if Komari was a figment of his imagination? It had crossed his mind that she died some time ago and he was just walking around with her memory. “…You hallucinated, Komari?”  
  
“It’s literally hundreds of degrees, Yagami, and I’m starving and dehydrated on top of exhausted. Yea, I have been seeing quite a bit.”  
  
So…a hallucination shouldn’t be hallucinating too, right? Uncertain but not going to let that stop him, he went back over to check her wound. It was…seeping despite the cauterization. Biting his lip, he used the diluted alcohol to clean it again, repacked it, and wrapped it with the thinnest bit of gauze. He had two fairly large rolls left but the wounds were huge…  
  
“What are you wasting supplies for?”  
  
“What?”  
  
Komari just rolled her eyes as he made a face, going to the seatbelt straps and staring at them. Okay…this needed to be secure and comfortable. Going to work at fashioning, Komari droned. “…You want a handy for the road?”  
  
“…The hell?”  
  
“I mean, I could blow you too but my mouth is like sandpaper though…”  
  
Shin stopped to look at her. She seemed…serious and he was just baffled. “…No. Stop that.”  
  
She smirked, “You thought about it.”  
  
“Did not” he snorted, going back to work.   
  
“It’s okay. I would hate to spend the afterlife arguing with Sumi on how I died with your cum in my mouth.”  
  
“Y’know, I’m honestly not sure I missed us talking right now.”  
  
Komari laughed literally dryly. Weirdo. No, he…he had to save this crazy human being that was still this chill with three gigantic bullet holes in her leg. Satisfied after fitting the buckles and straps together, he nodded. Okay.  
  
Komari’s face melted into _disbelief_ as he came over and picked her up. “Yagami _Shin_ , what in the _fuck_ do you think you’re doing?”  
  
“Well, you can’t walk so I have to carry you.”  
  
“ _Shin_.”  
  
She really did try to fight him but he got her into the harness against his chest. “Shin!! Shin, I am _a hundred pounds_ , you have to carry our _stuff—_ stop it!! Just _stop!”  
  
_ “Let’s just get this out, Komari: I’m not dying or going anywhere without you. As long as we’re in this desert, you’re coming with me, even if I have to carry you. Now stop yelling and wearing yourself out. Just tell me if you see someone behind me.”  
  
“Shin-n-n…”  
  
Whoo, yea, this was going to cut their mileage in half. But so be it. Heading forward, Shin took a deep breath.   
  
…Whatever it took, right, Koji? He was…at the end of the rope, exhausted, and it sure looked like everything was lost.  
  
…All that was left was for this to be finished, one way or another.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Day 55.   
  
It had been nineteen days since he started to carry Komari. She pleaded with him every single day that he stop. Some days, he pleaded with himself to stop. He wasn’t sleeping anymore. Their water supply was dwindling to nothing so he was drinking at an all time low. The food was pretty much done, just about five meals left that he’d been splitting. By all accounts, he should have been dead by now. Komari should have been dead by now. Like phantoms that just couldn’t let go, alas, they had made it nineteen days.  
  
Sometimes she fell into such deep slumbers he was convinced he had a cadaver strapped to him like a baby but she’d wake up and not speak. There was nothing to talk about this close to death.  
  
His legs buckled from underneath of him and he fell almost flat on top of Komari. “Shin…”  
  
“Sorry.”  
  
He sat up, grunting as she came with him. He just sat there like an abandoned toy, hunched over and lifeless. Because of their position, he basically ended up resting his head against her shoulder. She stroked his hair.  
  
“It’s over, hafu. I told you you weren’t good enough.”  
  
Shin looked to Bajiru, wondering why his tired imagination didn’t show him Nesha or his mom or something. Someone he’d want to see. Hell, Lyla had only popped up that _once_ , where was she at? He snickered. Good job, Shin, selective about hallucinations now, were we?  
  
He gazed as Komari cocked a gun. Well, that wasn’t a hallucination. “…Komari?”  
  
“…There’s enough bullets, Shin. One for you, one for me.”  
  
The gun shimmered in the blazing sunlight rather majestically, beckoning. ‘One for you, Shin, one for her. Take it, right to the head. That’s all you’d been doing all along, shooting people in the head. Yea, you cut one guy’s throat, choked the life out of that other man, but all along you’d been blowing people’s brains apart. See how it feels now’.  
  
Inhaling sharply, he shook his head and jerkily got to his feet. Komari groaned, holstering the gun again, “So to motivate you, I just have to suggest suicide, huh?”  
  
“Apparently” he muttered, dragging his feet across the sand.  
  
“…This still won’t end well, Shin.”  
  
“I know. Tell me a story.”  
  
Komari snorted, “Once upon a time, I was out in the desert with a crazy man…”  
  
“No” Shin sulked, the action hurting his face, “I told you about my family. Tell me…tell me about yours too. It’s not like we stand a good chance of making it. In nineteen days, I’ve gone like a hundred miles. Our…secrets die here.”  
  
She seemed to smile at that, gazing over his shoulder, “…Sorry, Shin, I don’t have your dark past. My papa owns a teahouse slash restaurant and my mom is a traveling salesman that’s always away. We live in a pretty awesome old style Japanese house with the sliding doors and everything. I got everything I wanted because I’m my papa’s only child and daughter and I had a hot girlfriend for a time. Things…things were good.”  
  
“I like to hear good things too.”  
  
Komari fell quiet so he just kind of zoned out again. That’s what he’d done for a while now. If he gazed far enough into the distance, he saw that mirage that was like a clash of purple and orange, a haze of waves that summoned him toward it a lot more frequently than before. It…seemed kind of like the light.  
  
“Can I tell you something not so good then?”  
  
Shin came back quickly, the last time he zoned Komari out having led to her being shot. Eh? “…Of course. I told you a sad story.”  
  
“…It’s not my story. But…I guess it’s…it’s okay, since we’re not going to make it out of here” she whispered.  
  
Okay… Komari stretched her legs a bit. Or, the good one. “…So there was this girl. Her mother died giving birth to her. She never knew her dad but her mom, she was seeing…this guy who took her in, wrote on her birth certificate that he was her father.”  
  
Shin nodded, stopping a moment to give his legs a brief break. Komari murmured, “…The dad, he ran like…well, by all terms, he ran a brothel. He tried to front it as a historical business but at night? Dudes and ladies were coming for one thing.”  
  
“…Ah.”  
  
“There’s a…sicko niche that can be fed in a place like that.”  
  
…. _No_. “…Komari.”  
  
“I know, I can stop.”  
  
This ‘someone’… “No. Go on.”  
  
“Well, this girl along with other girls were sold for thousands of dollars a night at the ‘tender’ age. Man after man that she would later see as monuments of our community would take advantage of her every night. Meanwhile, they’d go out, get praised, received love—while at night, they went and raped children.”  
  
“…Shit.”  
  
“As she got older, she started to learn to defend herself. In school, we could learn the naginata. You know, that old style weapon? Well, she learned how to use that, and, one night, she threatened her ‘father’ and said, if he didn’t let her out, she’d kill him. He tried to beat her but she whooped his ass and he relented. She left and started to live on her own by the time she was about, oh, eleven. She had some money left from her mom’s life insurance and she made side money tutoring kids on the island.”  
  
“…What the fuck?” he rasped under his breath.  
  
“Mm hmm. And when your basis of how men act is that they were paying to have sex with you, seeing boys your age grow into men, you get a warped idea that they’re all out to take advantage. When you spend enough time being manipulated but your choice is to pay for a roof over your head or therapy you keep the thought process that manipulation is appropriate. When…when no one had your back before, you see friends and relationships as volatile things where the other person must be out to betray you.”  
  
…Oh. Shin swallowed air, his throat dry, “…That’s why…you didn’t want to give up on them.”  
  
“That’s right.”  
  
Shin felt…ill but enlightened. “I get it, ‘Mari. I understand.”  
  
Komari almost hugged his neck, just in a difficult position to try to get comfortable, “…I do too, Shin. But it doesn’t mean I like it. I’ve asked that person to get help adjusting to the idea that that man? He was a horrible person. But expecting me to abide by your rules and your rules alone, that’s…that’s a remnant of that man and I want to be able to both love you and live as I normally should. I get a lot of boyfriends ask their girlfriends not to have male friends or vice versa but just…trust _me_ at least.”  
  
“…She probably wants to, Komari. And…you’ve probably made this worse for yourself.”  
  
“How _possibly_?”  
  
“…I’m going to get you back to her” he muttered.  
  
Komari laughed. It was bitter though. “Yagami…you see what we just went through, what we’re going through? The Zechs have probably taken my Sumi. They…they probably…they probably raped…raped her before…”  
  
He rubbed her back as she dissolved into tears or at least sobs. He wouldn’t be surprised if their bodies had no liquid left for tears. No, he…he got it.  
  
If Itoh Kasumi was anything like his brother, who had no _idea_ what happened to him and was still so ornery, so capricious, about such matters and people mistreating himself and his family, she…she hadn’t given in to that sort of end.   
  
No. Kasumi was waiting for Komari, very much alive. Kasumi could have given up on Komari when she kept insisting on being his friend but she didn’t because this was the one person she trusted. He…he wouldn’t stop until he got them back together.

Or die trying.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _“Mama?”  
  
Shin wasn’t sure if this was a memory or a dream. It seemed the latter, he couldn’t have been more than three, there was no way he’d…remember this. But his mom, just nineteen years old, walked in with a smile. “My Sweetie Plum. You get bigger every time I see you.”  
  
Yaya was there. She was probably sulking then too but he was just glad to see his mama. She picked him up and gave him a kiss on his cheek, much to his disgust. She laughed though. “Can’t I love on my baby sometimes?”  
  
“Gross” he pouted.  
  
“So silly.”  
  
“Koji? Nerimaru? They didn’t come?”  
  
“Not this time, Sweetie Plum. Mama can’t stay long either, I just wanted to see you.”  
  
Shin…was so confused that he didn’t have her full-time like he had his dad. Or why Koji and Nerimaru couldn’t live with them. He’d seen other families, they were all together. “Mama…I want you to live with me and papa. Koji and Nerimaru too.”  
  
“…I really want that too, Sweetie Plum. Not yet. We’re…we’re working on it. One day, we’ll be together again as a family and happy.”  
  
What about now, mama?  
  
_Shin was on his knees, shuffling, his boots full of blood, Komari’s heels dragging in the sand. His eyes hurt. They were probably damaged. The straps on the goggles melted, they had no protection anymore except the tattered robes that were coming apart after 65 days. Komari probably had stopped breathing but he couldn’t discern life from death anymore. It all felt the same.  
  
What was it…? August? August what? The kid. The kid with the potato soul, his birthday was this month, maybe. How old was he? How old were any of them?   
  
A family again, huh? That was a nice thought then, mama, but what about now? What place did the son with hundreds of lives on his hands have now? He let his best friend get shot, he strangled someone, he stabbed someone in the throat, he buried their bodies like they were just trash in unmarked holes—what was his place now in a family? A home. What…what was a home?  
  
“Intruders!!”  
  
He gazed off to the side. Huh. There was a building. He’d just been…languidly crawling beside a building. The Zechs. The Zechs started all this, those rotten bastards. They had eyes hanging in rooms just because of money. Money, of all things. Money…meant _nothing_ out here. And yet, they…shot them down out here…for capital.  
  
“…Yagami…”  
  
Oh, look, she wasn’t dead. Looking down at Komari, his eyes just…not focusing, he found she was holding that gun again with the two bullets for them both. He shut his eyes, sighing deeply. He was…he was depleted. Empty. Vacant. A void. He didn’t care what happened now. He tried every motivation. His family. A family full of wonderful people that would never believe this monster was their brother or son. He tried Komari, this person he allowed to get grievously injured and made believe salvation was out here, taking her from her beloved. She gave up long before him. He tried _her_ beloved…Komari was right, she was probably dead. They were all dead. They killed them.  
  
Shin gnawed his lip, opening his eyes as the Zechs started to surround them. Just…  
  
…What was…her deal? All he wanted…was to be with her…  
  
She had…always been there.  
  
It was the swiftest movement he could imagine, shooting the Zechs in front of him. Komari cried, “Yagami--”  
  
“Let’s go out fucking them up…one last time, Komari.”  
  
“…Fuck. Let’s do it then.”  
  
They were screaming as Komari, despite every physical ailment she had, dropped all five behind him. He…he had to protect her back so he shot with forced accuracy. Getting up and snatching a gun off a body, he gave one to Komari and just…ran. The gun was loud, especially right there in his ear, but pain failed to matter anymore. It…was all the same. But…  
  
He wanted to live. No matter the fact he had nowhere to go back to, no home to belong to, no family that deserved to see the monster he became, he…he did want to live.  
  
Like his arm, it didn’t really a hundred percent hit him except that his legs crumpled from underneath them. He laughed. He honest to goodness laughed because they hit him three times in the back of each leg. Twelve gunshots! He was going out just like Shin did!  
  
Komari sobbed. Yea, he…he was full of shit. He failed. However, she hugged his neck hard, weeping, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I-I was out of bullets, I’m sorry.”  
  
Oh. Embracing her tight, he shook his head and looked at the pistol he had. Two…two bullets were left.  
  
Sorry, mama, papa, Koji, Nelly, Tony, Jill, Shaun, Yaya… just…just know he died trying his best.  
  
Lyla…just…take your life back.  
  
Death was awfully loud though.   
  
He squinted, having forced his eyes shut as the Zechs closed in on them, but having to look up when he felt pressure and air. What?   
  
…It was a helicopter. A very…familiar helicopter. What? What was happening _now_?  
  
Out of _nowhere_ , hundreds of soldiers wearing fatigues that looked like theirs rushed out. What? What was going on? Why…?  
  
The Zechs were yelling and running, shooting. What?! Shin…didn’t believe in anything after this. However, unless…unless he was still hallucinating, Colonel Teramoto Ken stepped off the helicopter, looking around.  
  
It…it couldn’t be. It just… he screamed with all he had left, his voice damaged and arid, “C-Colonel Teramoto!!”  
  
The man looked up, startled, and stared at them. God, he probably would…would shoot them on the spot. That sort of irony after all this would just be _hilarious_. However, he very slowly got closer to them. He looked down at them for a long moment before saying…with absolute and complete incredulity, “… _Yagami_?”  
  
“Y-Yes sir…Y-Yamada is here too.”  
  
Komari was dead silent…if not just dead at this point, not responding to this…this wasn’t even a miracle, this was purely impossible. Colonel Teramoto was gaping. “…Holy _shit_.”  
  
Several other planes and helicopters were landing…how? The man looked back as the upper command that had been in the car with him back in Iraq came over. Teramoto barked, “Dorey, get a stretcher!”  
  
“Eh? Why? Aren’t these Zech soldiers?”  
  
“Do what I said.”  
  
Apparently ‘Dorey’ ran back to the plane and medics returned to cart them onto the transport. Teramoto was talking to Dorey for a moment before getting on with them. “Hold tight, Yagami, Yamada, we’ll get you to treatment immediately.”  
  
…Was he…was he dreaming? Wait…Wait. “Sir…did…did you…rescue our platoon? Did you find the others?”  
  
“Yagami, we thought you all got shot down going over _water_ , we had _no_ idea where you were, there was no active tracking signal.”  
  
“P-Please, sir, we…we have to go see…see if the others are alive.”  
  
“Shin…” Komari mumbled.  
  
The doctor onboard looked incredulous, “You two are in no shape to make any sort of journey except directly to a _hospital_. I don’t know what’s got you alive except an act of _God_. Your blood pressure is almost zero!”  
  
Teramoto sucked his cheek before grunting, “Do you even know where they are, Yagami?”  
  
Pointing to his bag, he murmured, “There’s…there’s a map. Please, keep it safe, sir, there’s…there’s information on it.”  
  
“…Try to stabilize them the best you can. If they’ve made it two months, they can probably stand a few hours.”  
  
Shin was turned on his side as the doctors worked to remove the bullets from his leg. They emphasized he needed to go into surgery immediately. He looked to Komari who was staring back at him emptily. No. He…God, if this…this wasn’t a dream, he completed one promise. Just…just please, please, let him be able to keep this very last one.  
  
He felt the descent but wasn’t sure why. If they got attacked again, just stick a fork in him, he was a trillion percent off the charts done. Komari also looked puzzled. It had been maybe…three, four hours? Teramoto gave them a look, “…We’re at where you said the plane went down.”  
  
…Come again? He and Komari exchanged a look…before they burst into laughter.   
  
_What_? _What_? They flew _four hours_ to get somewhere that took them _65 days_ to walk from? What the fuck? Teramoto blinked languidly, “…You’ve both snapped.”  
  
Obviously. The pilot from the cockpit spoke, “Sir, we see debris…this definitely looks like the crash spot.”  
  
Sobering up, Shin sat up when they opened the doors. Okay. They made it, it…it took a little longer than they thought but…  
  
“… _Fuck_ ” whispered a soldier.  
  
What? Shin felt his heart race…and he made a break for it, staggering like a rag doll. No, he…he had to see. “Yagami!” Teramoto bellowed.  
  
As soon as he hit the doors, what little life he had left? It felt like it just whisped away.  
  
Lying outside, there were over a dozen bodies scorched and cooked by the sun. He stared into the abyss and covered his mouth. No… _no_. Teramoto came out behind him and grimaced. “Fuck.”  
  
Shin unsteadily walked through. They…they were still wearing their camouflage. He recognized names. Satoru. Ayashi. Ueda. He stared at the body sitting in a chair, what appeared to be a bullet hole in the skull. Swallowing, he trembled. Fucking Kitamura.  
  
…Wait. Looking back at this…macabre graveyard, he felt…God, hope? In this death valley? Alas, he yelled, “Itoh!!”  
  
Trying to run but staggering, he called again, “Itoh!!”  
  
She wasn’t out here. Her body wasn’t. While that…may have meant she was taken, he just…he just had a feeling.  
  
Shin yelped when the cover on one of the crates flew off and there was Itoh, her skin dark and covered in blood and dirty sand. In her arms was a rifle and her eyes were cold and empty. She was ready to kill him and he was ready to hug her.  
  
However, she stared before her gun slowly fell. Her mouth fell open and she whimpered, “…Yagami?”  
  
Two other soldiers suddenly emerged, looking gaunt and weak. They also looked…shellshocked. “Oh-Oh my God, Yagami, you’re alive!!”  
  
“Yes…” he whispered.  
  
Teramoto came finally, looking…amazed. “…Well, if you aren’t an ornery bunch.”  
  
“Colonel Teramoto?!” one of the soldiers cried, “O-Oh my God, Yagami, you did it!!”  
  
Shin was about to faint, that was what he was about to do. Kasumi looked at him…very pleadingly. He smiled…or tried. He wasn’t sure he could ever smile again now. “…She’s okay, Itoh. She’s back in the plane.”  
  
Komari was shaking as she climbed out of the box, rushing toward the plane. The other soldiers followed as Shin stumbled back. Just…one more promise, Yagami.  
  
When they got to the doors, he did actually smile, he was sure of it, when he found Komari wrapped in Kasumi’s arms, the both of them weeping completely. Mission accomplished, Yagami.  
  
He blacked out. Now, live with it.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
End Notes:

If you’ve never played Rune Factory 4, just know…Prana is _ridiculous,_ aka Rune Prana. I don’t know what they were thinking or _why_ but some of the most overpowered boss fights in the game aside from Sharance. ‘Octo’, ‘Grimoire’, and a few other elements came from RF4 too.  
  
Why are the Zechs kind of…tactically dumb? Is this supposed to give Shin the up and up? No, if again you’ve never played the game, just kind of go…read over the Zechs’ in-game dialogue, they are _idiots_.  
  
Bastet! There is literally no way I will round out this series without having my favorite husband of all time not show up. If you don’t know, Leon’s last name is Bastet, I think it’s like Leon Bastet III or IV? He did appear in the last chapter of Third Generation but boy howdy, does that bad boy need some work.  
  
Breaking Benjamin is one of Ryuu’s favorite groups, I have seen them approximately three times now in concert and would have been a fourth this year if we weren’t in a pandemic. Shin listened to their song ‘Home’.  
  
So, no lie? American sex-education in the late 90s? I believe it was expressed to my class that menstruation can be ‘turned on’ at the hospital. Like…what? But that’s the inspiration for Shin’s nonsense moment there, lol.

See you Sunday!


	14. Funeral

**Chapter 14** : Funeral  
  
 **Author’s Note** : So, no lie, had to take a break to build a SpongeBob pinata… um…hats off to pinata makers. WARNING: Just some violence and macabre. We’re smut free for a while. Enjoy!

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

 _No. No…  
  
He was standing in a room. The eye room. The fucking eye room again. Gurgling. Blood was gurgling, the sensation of someone’s throat collapsing beneath his fingertips—it all pressed against his body and he choked. Stop. Stop. Let him out. Let him out.  
  
One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Shoot them through the head to stay alive.  
  
Gripping his ears, he panted as bodies fell into a hole, sand raining at first before blood. Yea…this, this is what his mind had been tormenting him with. He tried to…wake up.  
  
_“Keep him asleep. Give him more anesthesia.”  
  
 _They put him out for surgery and he saw…the scalpel. Yes, he panicked because part of him still felt like this was a dream, that these were Zechs trying to kill him, and he MIGHT have swung on one orderly before they got the sedative into his system. And yea, he…hadn’t been awake since.  
  
He stared gloomily as he walked through the valley of death. There might have been more soldiers that were alive but it just…looked like a whole hell of a lot were dead. He stopped, staring at Kitamura sitting in the same chair he last saw him with a bullet through the head, decaying. He didn’t like that bastard one bit but…he wasn’t looking for the guy to go out that way.  
  
“Why, Yagami?”  
  
Shin’s eyes widened as Kitamura’s curled lips started to move. God, why? Why? “I--”  
  
“You said you’d send help when you got to the base, why didn’t you?”  
  
“The…the phones, they didn’t work, so--”  
  
“You let all of these people DOWN, Yagami.”  
  
…Let him out. Please, let him out. Komari. Was he just imagining things? Was she alive? Did he save her, really? Or…or had he just…imagined…  
  
What if the wounds killed her? He did the best he could but…but he should have become a doctor. A doctor like his dad, then he really would have been of some use. Lyla and him, they could have been married if he was a doctor! He wouldn’t be here right now!  
  
Komari? Komari, where was she?! Komari!  
  
_“Give him another dose.”  
  
 _No, stop. Please, stop.  
  
_ Finding his way out of the jungle of his mind, Shin quickly gripped the hand about to give him more sedation. She squealed.  
  
He panted, looking at her. She…was very short, like, 4’11”, 149 centimeters tops. Her brown hair was about shoulder length and a white kerchief was on her head. Her honey brown eyes bounced in terror. Shaking, Shin whispered, “P-Please. Please, ju-just tell me…is…”  
  
Oh look, they must have hydrated him, he could cry again. Tears streamed down his face as he choked, “P-Please, i-is Komari okay?”  
  
“E-Eh?”  
  
“Komari. Yamada. Is-Is she okay? Did she die?”  
  
She looked startled as he wiped his eyes, shaking like a leaf. What…what did he live for if she died…?  
  
“…U-Um, j-just sleep until three, okay?”  
  
What? What did that have to do with Komari? Looking to her, frustrated, he found her fearful look was replaced with resolve. Eh? “J-Just trust me, it’ll be easier. Wait until three.”  
  
…Three. What was the deal with three? Could he see her body at that time or something? Pulling out a syringe, she murmured, “…I have to make it look good. I’ll-I’ll give you a smaller dosage so you’ll be coming around in about three hours. Okay?”  
  
Did…did he have to? Before he could ask, she pushed the injection into his IV and he was back in Crazy Town. Were…were you supposed to be able to dream on anesthesia?  
  
 _“Yagami-san_? Can you hear me?”  
  
Shin blinked languidly, staring at that same nurse, confused. He had had surgery once before the army for like a tooth thing and that’s exactly how sedatives worked: you snapped your finger and suddenly it was over. That’s what that just felt like. Hell, that three hours was the best blank sleep he’d had yet, he was almost irritated she’d interrupted it.   
  
The nurse had a wheelchair…oh yea, his legs were jacked. Awkwardly, he pushed them over the side as she disconnected his tubing, connecting it to the mobile version. She was eying him hard, like she expected he…was going to snap. Damn. “…I…I apologize if…if you were the nurse I harmed prior, ma’am. I…I wasn’t well.”  
  
Wasn’t? “…No, Yagami-san, I understand. Come on, we have to be fast.”  
  
Yea, well, he wasn’t in any hurry to view his friend’s corpse but he didn’t ask any questions. The hospital was like that of which he’d seen in a movie: sterile white hallways, walls, and white lights. It smelled…nauseatingly clean but he guessed he’d only smelled Earth for the last two months.  
  
She wheeled him quickly to the end of the hall, a few turns here and there. It was empty…why were they in an empty hospital?   
  
…Oh. No, the…the morgue…must have been vacant then.  
  
Clenching his eyes shut, he gripped the arm of the chair, prepared to tell the nurse he was okay, he didn’t need to see this. Alas, she turned so her back opened the door to a room and turned him.  
  
“…Well! You have some audacity to be lost in the desert with me for two months then go missing for three days.”  
  
…Eh?  
  
Shin gaped, finding Yamada Komari sitting up in a hospital bed, bandages on miscellaneous parts of her body, very…very much alive. She was smiling. She…  
  
He choked as the nurse pushed him over to the side of the bed, instantly burying his face in her lap and full-blown weeping. She lived. _She lived_.   
  
“Aww, my big ol’ crybaby” Komari said, soothingly stroking his hair, “What’s the deal? Seriously, I have been _begging_ for information about you for three days and all I’ve gotten is _bullshit_. I thought you left.”  
  
What? “I-I dunno” he sniveled, wiping his eyes, “I-I haven’t been-been awake three days, I don’t think.”  
  
“…What?”  
  
“I-I’ll almost wake up and-and someone says to sedate me again.”  
  
Komari stared at him. She looked…way better, like, three days had done a wonder. He…wondered what he looked like now.   
  
“…Was that your command, nurse?”  
  
Eh? The little nurse yelped, “N-No! It…”  
  
She paused. What? Komari cut her eyes at her, “…Hatanaka, wasn’t it? She told you to keep Yagami sedated, I presume.”  
  
Hatanaka? He didn’t know a Hatanaka. The nurse nodded slowly though. Komari’s face…darkened. “…I want Shin’s bed moved in here. There’s space in that corner.”  
  
“O-Oh, I--”  
  
“If Hatanaka says _shit_ to you or threatens you, tell her I’ll not only get her medical license pulled for improper administration of anesthesia, tell her don’t _think_ two months in the desert can keep me from kicking her ass. Lying ass bitch.”  
  
Shin stared at Komari as the nurse panicked, nodding rapidly, and rushing from the room. “…You know, I don’t know what you’re made of, Yamada, but it’s not of anything from this Earth.”  
  
Komari snickered, “I’m blustering, I probably couldn’t _completely_ kick her ass right now…”  
  
Yea, her leg was probably…  
  
Staring down at the covers, about to remark on that topic, he…wasn’t certain why the covers were dipping like that, like nothing was there on her left side. He actually reached out and touched it down…there…there was nothing there, why…?  
  
Oh. There goes his breath again.  
  
“Shin--” Komari said quickly.  
  
Oh. A panic attack. That’s what that was, this was a panic attack, he wheezed, gripping his chest. She lost her leg. She lost her leg because of him.  
  
“SHIN” Komari snapped, grabbing his shoulders, “Listen to me CLOSELY: we were in the fucking desert for _two months._ Zechs soldiers were popping up at random, we were _starving,_ we almost ran out of water--”  
  
 _Her leg_ was gone _._ “SHIN. You got me out of there _alive_. You never gave up on the fact that this? This was a possibility. I had given up when we got to the _base_ and there was no phone line, you carried us for over a month on just the prospect of there being hope. You got me here _alive_.”  
  
“But your leg—” he sobbed.  
  
“—The person that once had that leg is _still here_. If the _leg_ had made it and I didn’t, what would you be saying right now?”  
  
Oh God. Burying his face in his hands, he rapidly shook his head. Oh God. Komari grunted, hugging his shoulders, “Just a big damn softy. You’ll never be anything but gold to me, Blue Eyes, so stop eating on yourself like this. You did the absolute best you could and we’re alive now for it. Don’t you see?”  
  
…No.

“What the hell is this?”  
  
Komari looked up sharply and he pulled away, still…shellshocked. No matter what she said, that…that was a limb gone. This…   
  
“Itoh Kasumi—I put up with _a lot_ of shit out of you. I knew where you were coming from and that you interpreted things differently due to your experiences” Komari hissed, “But this? This is unforgiveable.”  
  
“You _lost your leg_ because of him, Komari!!” Kasumi countered, walking back into the room with a black haired doctor.  
  
“What am I, surrounded by _idiots_? I almost took those three shells _to the back_. Shin tried to save me, they went through my leg. I had gotten shot over _thirty days ago_. Shin treated the wounds so well, the infection didn’t even spread past the leg and into my body which could have _killed ME. ME._ I am _grateful_ that it just killed _my leg_. And don’t you _dare_ pretend this was about a leg!”  
  
Shin rubbed his eyes as Komari’s narrowed, “…I’m sorry, Sumi, but my boy here is here with me for the long haul. If you want to use your cronies to try to keep him _sedated_ and away from me, you can disappear.”  
  
Why was she so mean?! “No, no, no” Shin quivered, waving his hands, “No, you-you don’t mean that, Komari, stop.”  
  
He presumed ‘Hatanaka’ looked angry. “…You deserve better than that, Kasumi-san.”  
  
“Take her” Komari spat.  
  
Jesus. Kasumi stared numbly at Komari before huffing, turning her head. Of course, just at that moment, the nurse that brought him here returned with his stretcher and squealed. Oops. Hatanaka glared daggers at her. Komari snarled, “Miss, what is your name?”  
  
“E-Eh? Oh, I-I’m Hakuryu Violet.”  
  
Shin was miserable but his ears perked. Hakuryu…he’d heard that name before somewhere. Komari smiled, “That’s a pretty name…and if I hear Hakuryu-san faced any sort of unjust treatment following this, _ladies,_ I will throw one or both of you out of a window. I’ll be fucked if you get to treat him like shit while I’m not looking and Teramoto is off handling business.”  
  
“…I’m going to bed” Kasumi said lowly, going to the hospital bed nearby.  
  
She pulled the curtain and Hatanaka walked quickly over. They were whispering. Komari rolled her eyes as Shin frowned, “…What’s the deal there?”  
  
“…Well, Yagami, unfortunately…”  
  
…Oh yea, shit, the secrets were supposed to die with them. He mouthed slowly, ‘was Hatanaka one of the other girls in the brothel?’. Komari nodded in confirmation. Shit.  
  
“Oh good, almost all of you are here.”  
  
Shin jumped, startled, as Colonel Teramoto Ken entered the room with Officer Dorey. In Dorey’s hand was…the map. Oh, thank God, they…they hadn’t had time to explain that that definitely didn’t need to be crumbled up and thrown in the trash.  
  
Hatanaka emerged from the curtains, alarmed, “A-Ah, Colonel.”  
  
“Doctor Hatanaka, Nurse Hakuryu, will you bring the other two here? We need to have a…discussion.”  
  
…What? They both nodded, quickly exiting the room as Kasumi pushed the curtain back. Komari stared at her drearily while Kasumi looked pissed. Well…so much for the lovebirds.  
  
Staring into the distance as they waited, he watched the wall slowly…start to warp. Purple and orange, just like in the desert. He almost…stood to walk toward it…  
  
Shin yelped when Komari smacked his bad shoulder _hard_ , “Snap out of it.”  
  
“Fucking _ow_ , Yamada.”  
  
“You got that look and you’d start talking to Sato and Bajiru, whoever the fuck that is. Stop it.”  
  
… “…You _heard me_?”  
  
“Uh, yea, you were…definitely speaking but it wasn’t to me” Komari nodded slowly.  
  
“Told you your brain was half of. Less than” Sato snorted, sitting in a chair, “You’re a disgrace, Yagami. A fucking disgrace.”  
  
Hell. Ignoring him because apparently his mind conversations hadn’t been taking place in his mind like he thought they were, Shin exhaled as the two soldiers that had been in the box with Kasumi entered. Soga and Koike, if he remembered correctly. Violet got them chairs as they sat, seeming…miserable. Yea, he…got it.  
  
Teramoto closed the doors, signaling Violet to close the blinds. Eh? “…Everyone in this room, minus the pilot and about two other soldiers, are the only ones aware that the five of you are alive.”  
  
…Shit. Shit! He…he had to call his dad. After this, he…he had to call him. Teramoto opened a notebook, drawling, “We’ll start with you, Yagami, Yamada. Mission summary.”  
  
Shin looked to Komari as she outranked him. She swallowed before murmuring. “We were on our way to do a supply run to one of our barracks. It appears that the pilot took us away from the flight plan and, as such, we drew attention from the Zechs that were in the area we call “Prana”. They shot one small missile into the bottom of the plane which killed our lieutenant and several soldiers. While the pilot was landing, they shot another missile through the front of the plan and killed our pilot.”  
  
“When we were able to disembark, we were able to fight off around…a hundred Zechs soldiers, taking casualties numbered at about twenty. Yagami located on the map that the Grimoire base was 350 miles from where we crashed. I admit that I and Kitamura talked him out of it and he reasoned to wait ten days in the case that the army rescued us. During that time, we took two additional attacks from the Zechs which cut our unit down to fifty. I still tried to talk Yagami out of it but he was bent on trying to reach a hotline at the Grimoire base. Thus, we took our portion of supplies, and headed out to the base.”  
  
“We…came across a camp that the Zechs were—are keeping Terrans before we reached the base. We came into contact with two Zechs’ lookouts and were forced to execute them or be revealed. When we got to Grimoire, it appears that the line had been cut. Yagami and I stayed there and were attacked by more soldiers. We executed them and utilized their vehicle to drive us into the desert. Yagami reasoned we could attempt to reach the coast near Yemen.”  
  
Shin buried his face in his hands. Everything was his idea… “The truck ran out of gas—we walked, I took three bullets to the leg. Shin stole the vehicle of those that shot us after killing them then drove us until the gas ran out. Then, we got on the dune buggy he secured and drove that until the gas ran out. Then, Yagami proceeded to carry me. We came across around a dozen camps, notched as x’s on the map. You’re aware of the rest, sir. Yagami took shots to his legs then you found us.”  
  
Teramoto slowly shook his head, “…It’ll do but I’ll need details. What did you do with the bodies?”  
  
Biting his lip, Shin whispered, “…We buried everything. Bodies, trucks, the dune buggy—we left no evidence on the surface when we left.”  
  
“Excellent.”  
  
What? Teramoto flipped the page, drawling, “Itoh, what happened back at the camp?”  
  
Kasumi was silent. Hmm? Komari looked at her as Kasumi sat up a bit straighter, clearing her throat, “I…I apologize, Colonel. I would like…to defer to Soga this once.”  
  
Soga grimaced, wringing his hands. He looked…distraught, “U-Um, really, a-after Yagami and Yamada left, we…we really didn’t see anymore Zechs’ soldiers, sir. At least, I should say, not for like…twenty or so days, maybe? They…they came out of nowhere. We…we had gone off to-to hunt, me, Itoh, Koike, and Fumo. There were some…some animals we found we could eat. We hadn’t…quite left yet so we took cover.”  
  
…Fumo? “They ravaged the camp. Shot Kitamura right in the head where he was sitting and-and killed…all but us. Fumo…Fumo killed himself, he-he panicked. We managed to…to hide and avoid it. They…they never came back but…we struggled to stay alive up until you found us.”  
  
Shin stared at them. That… “…They killed…almost a hundred of us.”  
  
Soga nodded weakly. Almost…a hundred people…dead. Shin ran his hands down his face, rasping, “…Out of our…our entire platoon, five of us— _five of us_ made it. Only-Only _five percent_ of us made it.”  
  
… _Why_? They all bowed their head, an undeniably gravity forcing down on their shoulders. What…what the hell gave him the _grace_ to be _one_ of _five_?   
  
“…Yagami, these x’s. These are the Terran camps, right?”  
  
Shin looked up and just nodded numbly. Teramoto looked to Dorey who nodded, “…We got bamboozled on some military…tactics the Zechs suggested. They were really starting these mini camps in the desert where we weren’t looking. Where you mysteriously ended up, Yagami, Yamada, we were just trying to recover a recently caught village. They…they don’t know we have a location for a good chunk of their camps.”  
  
Teramoto nodded, clearing his throat. “…We want you all…to stay dead.”  
  
They stared at him, puzzled. What…? “…What do you…mean?” Komari said slowly.  
  
“We’ve brought you to a hospital to a floor where you’re the only occupants aside from a few doctors and nurses. It’s…going to be a lot to ask. But I don’t think either of you, Yamada, Yagami…I don’t think you’re going to want to see what you accomplished compromised.”  
  
…What… _more_ could they possibly _ask_ of them? “Yagami, Yamada, we would like to send you home tomorrow.”  
  
“…What?”  
  
“We want to send you home tomorrow. We can’t…risk any record of having you alive. You’re all operating under John Doe type names right now and aren’t members of our military. We have moles. If we put you in army watch apartments or witness protection, it might get back. I can fly in tomorrow morning with you all, drop you off, and you stay in your homes until we say it’s time to come out. I trust your families…more than I trust other areas right now.”  
  
Wait. Wait. “… _Tomorrow_?” Shin exclaimed, “ _T-Tomorrow?_ Colonel… _no_. No, you can- _cannot_ send me back to my _family_ like this. I am—I am not…I’m not good right now, sir. I-I need _help_ , I might-I might _snap._ ”  
  
He fought a nurse trying to _help him_. He was-he was not _deprogrammed_. He was still on _kill mode_ and they weren’t even going to try to _shut it off_? Dorey, who seemed nonchalant, assured, “We’ll send you with Pentobarbital and Xanax.”  
  
Shin couldn’t even register what he just heard. Komari…laughed. It was entirely humorless. “He tells you…he’s afraid for his family’s safety because we are in—in a heightened sense of self-preservation…I need you all to _understand_ , Yagami and I slit some guy’s _throats_ out there, we had to literally cut jugulars—fuck, we _are not slightly good to go home_. And your response to this…is we’ll send a shit ton of _drugs_ with you?”  
  
Teramoto shot Dorey a look, the second seeming surprised, “I assure you, Yamada, Yagami, we fully respect— _all of you_ for making it through that situation. Every one of your files say you’re dead right now based off you fell in the water. If we knew you fell in the desert, the same _definitely_ would have occurred because that desert was _hell_ when we were running Grimoire. I won’t even pretend I know what you’re going through—but if the Zechs pull those Terrans out of those locations now, we’re back at square one. Please, you…don’t have to agree, but I’m asking if you can possibly let this run for three months.”  
  
Three…months. They all blanched, staring at the two. They wanted them…to stay in hiding…in murderous homicidal mode…with their families…for _three months_?   
  
Koike, whom had been silent, slowly nodded, “…I…I didn’t do an ounce of legwork. I thought…I thought Yagami was crazy when he and Yamada left, that Yamada would leave and come back. But they…they did bring you guys to get us. I owe them my life, so…whatever they say, I’ll go for. My mom and step-dad will let me sit in the basement for a few months if I tell them it’s a mission.”  
  
Soga nodded, “S-Same. My parents own a dumpling shop, I…I can fold dumplings at night to earn my keep and they’ll definitely cover for me. Whatever Yagami and Yamada say.”  
  
…Really? Kasumi glanced to Komari, muttering, “…I don’t have an apartment right now and I…I don’t have parents. I know…her father will cover for me so I can stay with them if…Komari is willing.”  
  
So…it was up to them…whether thousands of Terrans were rescued or they all potentially got home and murdered their families.  
  
…He smiled. Maybe. “Shin?” Komari said wearily.  
  
“…I don’t want…to do it to him but…I do have a relative that will probably fight me to the death for kicks. My father…probably has access to sedatives and can maybe fly under the radar to get tranqs if I need to be stopped. I…I can go underground for three months or so.”  
  
Komari tipped her head, nodding, “…Yagami says he can do it, I can do it too.”  
  
“Just to reiterate…this means you cannot call anyone. When you get home, if no one’s there—you cannot call and announce you’re alive. No emails. No…going out unless your home is on _fire_. If you _must_ go out, obscure yourselves entirely. This is a covert mission to keep yourselves _dead_.”  
  
…Really. They all just nodded.   
  
…Home. A place…he couldn’t deserve less.  
  
Just live with it.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
Yagami Shin’s head was relaxed against the headrest as he sat in the back of a normal car. It had insanely tinted windows but he was wearing a hood and sunglasses just in case. While he shaved his beard before he got on the plane, they advised to just keep his hair long, that it’d help with a ‘new identity’ should anything go wrong. Sure…whoever he was didn’t care anyway.  
  
It was weird to him to come in the middle of the day. Wouldn’t it be better to move at night? Teramoto scoffed, “Aren’t people that drive around at night more suspicious than the day, Yagami?”  
  
…Not really? But again, whatever. If they got caught at this junction, it wasn’t on him. He gazed at the shops they passed, people walking around and seeming normal. He…felt oddly indifferent to normal right now. It was actually a bit scary.  
  
He closed his eyes for about ten minutes and felt them turn. Looking up, he stared…at trees. Trees… “…Where are we?” he questioned lowly.  
  
Teramoto leered over his shoulder, “…I _hope_ this is your house, Yagami.”  
  
…Was it?  
  
Shin stared and, sure enough, this looked like the place where he sat on the porch and mourned dead rock stars. He might have sat in his brother’s car in that spot over there and told him he wanted to save people like he was a god. How…stupid.  
  
“…All right, Yagami, I’ll be honest with you: out of all five of them, you seem the most baked. I can put you in a home by yourself but it’s just going to up the chances of you getting noticed since I have to have groceries and supplies delivered to you. I feel like this is the better option.”  
  
Of course he did. Shin shrugged, “…I’ll be fine, Colonel. Honestly? My…my family has probably been through worse than me.”  
  
Maybe. Teramoto nodded slowly, “…Yagami, I am sorry about all you went through. But this? This is…monumental. We’ve never been in a place yet where we can one up the Zechs. It’s no replacement for your sanity but you did…you did a good job and I am proud you’re doing this.”  
  
… “Thanks.”  
  
“Head in. I gave you your key.”  
  
“Okay.”  
  
Grabbing his bag, he wandered up the steps, leaning on the cane and booting himself up each step. Teramoto asked if they got a lot of company. Hardly. He was certain _no one_ was home in the first place. Gazing off to the side, he saw the dark haze in the distant trees, calling him like always. No, not…not yet. Keeping his eyes low, he jumped when the door opened slowly without him knocking. What?  
  
He stared. At the door was Yagami Dana. She was peeking out before opening it more. Her dark eyes gazed at him and he figured she wondered who this burnt crazy looking long-haired man was at her door. He…almost introduced who…she once knew.   
  
“…Shin” she breathed.

His heart…actually skipped as her face dissolved into tears. “Oh! Oh my God, Shin!!”  
  
Oh shit, he was going to get his cover blown within the first minute. Gently, or what he imagined was gentle, pushing her into the foyer and closing the door, he gasped as she hugged him tightly, crying so…so hard. “Shin, oh-oh, my-my Sweetie Plum, yo-you’re home. You’re finally home.”  
  
Sweetie Plum? Finally…finally home, what? No one…no one knew. Why…why was she…she here? He whimpered, “Mama, I…I don’t understand, did…did someone call you? What are you doing home?”  
  
Dana sniffed in, wiping her eyes, “Si-Silly thing, d-didn’t I say I would wait for you?”  
  
… “M-Mama, I’ve-I’ve…I’ve been gone for-for over two months now—there was nothing to wait for” he protested.  
  
She rapidly shook her head, gripping his cheeks, “…I got little feelings here or there. They…they almost broke me but I…I felt it. I felt you were alive out there, no matter what they said, and you’d come back.”  
  
… _How though_? Biting his lip as she pulled him to kiss his forehead, he trembled and embraced her completely, collapsing to his knees, “Mama, oh my God— _Mama.”  
  
_ Despite how he felt literally anyone else would have barraged him with a million questions, Yagami Dana just held him as he wept in anguish, quietly stroking his back and hair. She didn’t shush him or anything, letting him get…some of it out. Most of it, he…he wasn’t ready to let go. Not to her, not…not to place on his mama.  
  
She helped him up once he was done, shaky as she walked him to the couch. Oh…the couch. She put him on the elongated piece where he once napped, carefree. She held his hand after taking off his glasses and staring at him, “…What happened, Sweetie Plum?”  
  
“…Enough…where I definitely don’t deserve that name…”  
  
“You’ll stop being my Sweetie Plum when I stop breathing” she said firmly.  
  
God _forbid_. He grimaced as she looked at him beseechingly, “…They called, said your plane went down in the water. Your skin and hair are burnt…you were still in the desert, weren’t you?”  
  
Sharp as hell. “…Our pilot, he took a wrong route. We…we were shot down in the desert by the Zechs. I…and my friend, Yamada, we went out to try to get…help. I…we tried to go to an old base and it hadn’t worked so we…we trekked until someone found us. We…we were out there for 65 days. My…my friend…she…she lost her leg and…and I’m only one person out of five that made it, mama, and there was _a hundred_ of us. I’m…”  
  
I’m absolutely insane. Dana squeezed his hand tight, “…As always, you’re a blessing.”  
  
His eyes widened at this as Dana smiled, “…I know how you and your father work. You’re probably in turmoil over everything that had to happen for you to live. I’m here to tell you both that it may not have been anything supernatural or spiritual, but the fact that you made it? That has meaning and purpose, you’re not just some random statistic.”  
  
…Really? He doubted it. She suddenly pouted, “….You’re injured. Let me look at your wounds.”  
  
“O-Oh, no, mama, that’s…”  
  
“When’s the last time they were cleaned? I will not have them getting infected” she huffed.  
  
…No one like a doting mom. She went upstairs and grabbed a freshly washed sheet to relax under his legs, unwrapping the bandages at ease since he’d been wearing jersey shorts. He winced as he felt her sharply inhale. Getting shot in the back of the legs…generally only meant a couple of things. One thing was…he was running.  
  
His mother didn’t say anything though. She took the saline he had in his bag and irrigated the bullet holes after removing the old packing. Taking the tweezers out of the set, she hummed soothingly as she pushed the fresh iodoform packing in. He smiled softly at her as she wrapped them up, way more gentle than she should have but, well, this…was his mama. “…Thank you, mama.”  
  
“Of course, my sweetie” she whispered, kissing his temple…before jumping to her feet, “Now I need to call your father immediately.”  
  
Oops. “W-Wait, mama, no.”  
  
“No?” she demanded, looking at him dead in the eye.  
  
Oh boy. “Y…Yea. Let me, uh…explain a few things first.”  
  
So, he essentially advised his mother that the army, who advised her that her first born child was dead, needed him to _stay_ dead and that no one needed to know he was alive. Yep. Dana stared at him blankly. “…I’m sorry, what?”  
  
“Mama…”  
  
“You…mean to tell me…you were lost in the desert for two months, struggling, starving, and dying…while your family back here either thought you were _dead_ or had no idea where you were…and they send you back, asking…that you stay dead…until they finish whatever the hell it is they need to do? Which means…I can’t call…your father, to tell him _his baby_ is home.”  
  
“…Yea?” he drawled pitchily.  
  
Squeezing the bridge of her nose, Dana smiled…tightly. “…Do they need me to go fight the Zechs _and them?_ Because, I will, in that order.”  
  
Shin found himself smirking. He needed someone to come home, he adored his mother too much for him to lose it around her. No, he’d…he’d hold his shit together, this…this was, undeniably, one reason he made it through the desert.   
  
“…All right. God knows I will _not_ cause all of what you accomplished while you were suffering to be in vain. It will take…everything in me that loves your father to not do it but I will do it for you, Sweetie Plum.”  
  
“Thank you, mama…”  
  
Kissing his forehead, she helped him take off his hoodie and propped him against the pillows, covering him. “Get some sleep. I will _covertly_ go to the store and get you all your favorite meals because you’re _stick thin_ and I will not have it.”  
  
No. No, sleep…sleep was where he was the most dangerous. “No, mama…wait. Um…if…if I do fall asleep? And it…it seems like I’m restless, just….well, don’t…don’t try to…comfort me, okay?”  
  
Dana’s brows furrowed and he almost thought she’d scoff. Alas, she nodded, “I understand, Sweetie. Get some rest the best you can, I won’t be long.”  
  
“…All right, mama.”  
  
“I love you, Shin” she whispered.  
  
…He felt that was a bit too soon to say. Give it time. “…I love you too, mama.”  
  
…He meant it though. Please…please, he just…needed him. If anything happened to her, he…he wouldn’t be able to live with himself and he couldn’t even do so right now.  
  
….Welcome home.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _Shin was sitting on top of a building, severed arms all around him as he sat on the edge, dangling his feet. A rifle was in his hands and little mice were running below. He shot them for…no real reason. One. Two. Three. Four. Five.  
  
He jumped down to see if they were dead. Instead, he found Komari, Kasumi, Koike, and Soga’s bodies with their heads blown off. His pulse started to race and he screamed. No. God, no.  
  
Something was dripping…onto his shoulders. Shakily reaching up, he looked at fingertips and found it was blood. Going for his head, he screeched when he found a huge bullet hole right through his skull.  
  
Fuck.  
  
_“WHAT?”  
  
Shin’s eyes popped open, shocked, sitting up and reaching for his pocket mindlessly. Shit, he had nothing, why did he have nothing? Where were his knives and guns? Had they disarmed him?  
  
He stared at…a television, as Spike Spiegal was on the screen, speaking to Faye Valentine, while he lied stretched across their designer couch in the living room under their specialty throw blanket.  
  
Fuck.  
  
Alas, looking up, he finally realized a new voice had emerged. That ‘what’…from around the corner, in emerged one Yagami Koji.  
  
His younger brother looked _about_ the same but his hair was a bit longer, kind of hanging over one of his ultra wide eyes right now. Shin stared at him drearily. “…Hey, bro. I made it.”  
  
“… _Dude_.”  
  
Shin managed to get to his feet, kind of slumped because his legs were not for all this movement given they had rather large bullet holes in both of them. Koji stared at him, wide-eyed, probably because he looked like a freak of nature. Alas…Koji managed it with Jill, but he was never good with…affection with them. Koji winced and hugged him. “ _Fuck_.”  
  
Patting his back, Shin mumbled, “…You told me to fight for my life, right?”  
  
“Yea. Not gonna lie though, I was…I was pulling for you but…you were starting to get me there for a second.”  
  
Smiling at that as Koji helped him back down, Dana entered with a tray of food, “For my Sweetie Plum.”  
  
“Oh, mama, that…that’s probably way too much” he murmured.  
  
“Eat what you can” she assured, “I’ll be right back.”  
  
“…Thank you.”  
  
Oh. “…Itedakimasu.”  
  
He struggled to pick up the chopsticks, the act almost foreign to him. Alas, he picked up a bit of the skipjack teriyaki and ate it. Oh…oh God. He almost melted, closing his eyes as he leaned back. His mind couldn’t handle it was eating _flavor_ right now, shit.

“…So, can you explain to me why our mother is sitting on this…fucking _gold mine piece of information_? Do you have _any_ idea what this has done to the family for the last few months?” Koji grunted, sitting on the end of the chaise to look at him.  
  
Cringing, Shin miserably ate a bit of rice. Yea, he…could only imagine.   
  
So, he explained to Koji, of all people, why he was…dead until otherwise discovered to this family alone. Koji stared at him just like their mother had. “… _Fuck them, Shin_.”  
  
“Koji. I cannot say ‘fuck you’ to those Terrans out there in the desert. It’s paining me but that is literally why I joined the army: to help them. I need there to have been a reason for me being out there, going through hell, and that reason would be saving their lives.”  
  
Koji had buried his face in his hands, kneading his skull, “…Shin, you look…fucking terrible, no offense. You look like you went through _hell and more_. I _get it_ but when is enough enough?”  
  
“After the job is done” he muttered.  
  
“…You know I’m not going to just sit here and act dumb, right?”  
  
“Koji.”  
  
He shrugged and Shin leered. Mr. Chaos his damn self. “…Koji, I need you. And it’s a selfish request and you can tell me to go to hell but I need you.”  
  
“…How?”  
  
“I…I got issues, Koji, okay? I’ve seen things…I’ve done things…that I can never take back or get back. I might forgive myself one day but I haven’t yet. And…due to the mission, they didn’t give me…any sort of treatment. I am…a ticking time bomb and I have to stay here with our mother and younger siblings and I will shoot myself if I hurt them, Koji. I don’t…I don’t want you to fall behind in school…but if there is _any way_ possible…you can…can be here to protect them from me, I’d like to request you do so.”  
  
Koji just looked at him for a long time. What? What was it? Was…was he not worth it? He…he probably wasn’t in the scheme of things.  
  
“…You know I got you, dumbass. I’ll move my classes to Saturday so Nelly can watch you that day while I watch you the rest of the week.”  
  
Eh? “Are…are you sure?”  
  
“I can pull it for a semester…or longer, if need be” Koji reassured, reaching for his bookbag.  
  
Oh. “T-Thank you, Koji. Why…why are you here now?”  
  
“Checking on mama” he said simply, taking out a random…jar. “And usually I want to see if anyone had heard anything. But mostly mama. You know dad hasn’t been home in like a month and a half?”  
  
 _What_? “T-That’s crazy!! Mama’s still his _wife_!”  
  
“Optimism isn’t dad’s strong point” Koji droned, opening up some kind of metal and pouring in…  
  
Shin stared at Koji’s…activity before grunting, “…So dad’s not home because mama had faith I wasn’t dead.”  
  
“Eh, for the most part. That, and pouring himself into work was his therapy since he was a child, I guess” Koji mused, spinning the top of apparently a grinder.  
  
Ridiculous. Shin’s eyes narrowed as Koji nipped a rolling paper to wet it after lining up weed crumbles in a row. Just about as ridiculous as Koji rolling up a blunt in their _parent’s living room_. He honest to truth forgot how _insane_ his family was while he was getting insane in the desert, good lord.  
  
Koji flipped out his lighter, indicating that he was, _indeed_ , going to smoke pot with their mom in the next room. “…Y’know, Koji, I…might need some time to ease myself back into your peculiarities.”  
  
Snorting, Koji took a puff before… _handing it to him_? “ _Koji_.”  
  
“You’re not sleeping.”  
  
…Eh? Shin stared at him, wide-eyed, as Koji looked at him seriously. “Probably eating you up inside, whatever it is. Can’t sleep, don’t think you can, right? The dreams, or lack thereof, probably make you feel like you’re losing it or something’s wrong with you.”  
  
… _Shit_. Shin shivered as his brother, the one that dealt with dark dreams long before Shin enabled them in himself, stared back evenly. “It helps me sleep. I don’t have any dreams or have to focus on them with this strain. Take a puff.”  
  
…Oh man. Shakily taking it, setting his empty tray aside, he slowly inhaled. Shit, he…he wasn’t expecting that. Here…here he was bellyaching over trauma he at least…recalled and could possibly deal with.   
  
…Unfortunately…Koji was the one for this job.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Nothing…natural like that did Shin expect to work. He needed hard drugs like the ones he had almost a mason jar of in his bag. Alas, one minute he was slightly chatting with Koji, the next…  
  
Like Koji said, he was in a nice warm void that had him entirely…well, at peace or at least stoned. Whatever the case, Koji was not wrong, he was completely calm and he slipped into a hard, deep sleep that didn’t have him shooting himself or his friends. He was, in fact, doing absolutely nothing but sleeping and, bless that mystical weed, he needed it.  
  
He wasn’t certain how long he was asleep but eventually he just felt like he needed to pee. Literally…the most ANNOYING sensation in the universe was getting into a nice cozy sleep and then having to get up to go to the bathroom. It…took some time for him to acclimate these last three days to the fact he had facilities for such now. And, well, he doubted his mom would appreciate him peeing on their sofa, so…  
  
Opening his eyes, he froze. Again, he tried to reach for his empty pockets. Sitting some feet away was a blonde young woman wearing a sweatshirt and a pair of shorts, her hair streaming down her shoulders as she scribbled in a notebook. Occasionally, she’d reach up and rub her eyes, apparently crying. What the hell was this? Where was Koji? Who…  
  
Shin was cheek down in the couch in his own drool. Watching her for at least about three minutes, he noted she had blue eyes. A blonde…with blue eyes…  
  
“…Jill?”  
  
His only baby sister looked up rapidly before she sobbed, “Nii-san!!”  
  
What…what the fucking hell? He groggily sat up as she barreled into his chest, hugging him tightly. “Nii-san!! Oh, I-I’m sorry!! I’m sorry, m-mama and Koji, they s-said to have faith in you coming home but I didn’t and-and I’m so sorry, nii-san!!”  
  
“…Don’t be silly, imoto” he murmured faintly, holding her and stroking her hair, “I would question it too, you are just fine.”  
  
“No. No, I-I should have had hope for you…”  
  
Shin wasn’t worried about that. He was worried about how his baby sister looked like a damn young adult! Gently pushing her away, he stared at her face as she looked confused. She probably had boys around her like the _air they breathed_.  
  
“Oh yea, you see ol’ bombshell here?”  
  
Looking up when Koji entered, holding his phone, Jill leered, “Shaddap, nii-san. I don’t look that different.”  
  
“The hell you don’t! I barely recognize you! You probably have to knock them back with a bat!” Shin sulked.  
  
Jill sighed, rolling her eyes, “Ya’ll are so rich…you’re literally MIA after a year and then you come back with the same nonsense like you never left.”  
  
“Believe me, that’s…a bit refreshing for me” he murmured.  
  
She frowned as he gently pulled away, rubbing his face, “…I didn’t think anything was going to feel the same for me, if I made it.”  
  
“Nii-san…”  
  
Oh, right, he had to pee. Grabbing his cane, this managed to alarm both Jill _and_ Koji. “What the fuck, Shin??”  
  
“Relax. I…hopefully won’t need it forever.”  
  
Limping off, he found the clock in the kitchen read 6:38…his mom was humming as she appeared to be cooking again. Sheesh. Going into the bathroom, he relieved himself and turned to wash his hands. Shin wiped his hand on the towel, staring at himself in the mirror. He…was a wreck.  
  
When he headed back out, his mom was all smiles. “Did you sleep well, Sweetie Plum?”  
  
…After smoking pot in your living room? “…Yes, mommy.”  
  
She smirked for some reason, probably because weed smelled awful and she knew what he’d done. However, she didn’t rebuke him. “Get off that leg. I’m going to check it again in a few hours.”  
  
“Thank you, mom…”  
  
“What happened to your legs?” Koji demanded as he shuffled back into the room.  
  
With a sigh, Shin stretched back on the couch. Jill quickly covered him back up with the blankets, frowning, “…You don’t look so good, nii-san. Are…are you sick?”  
  
“…I was in the desert the whole time, Jill. It was…120 degrees out there almost every day and we had to moderate water and food. No sunscreen and…well, I was walking hundreds if not thousands of miles. I probably look a little rough right now.”  
  
Jill trembled as Shin groaned, “…And, before they rescued me, I got shot in the back of the leg by the Zechs. Three bullets in each leg so I got shot six times.”  
  
“And they just want you to sit around and play dead. Fucking bullshit” spat Koji, stalking away.  
  
Their sister gripped his hand, looking at him beseechingly, “…Are you really…really okay though, nii-san?”  
  
“…I won’t lie, Jilly, I’ve…I’ve been way better. But, enough about me, how…how are you? You really are scaring me with how different you look. I bet Shaun is going to mess me up too.”  
  
Jill nodded slowly, “…Him and Tony _do_ look different so…I guess I would too.”  
  
Great. “How…How is Tony? I never got to talk to him after I left.”  
  
“Oh, he’s way better now, nii-san!” Jill insisted, “I-I wish we could tell, I bet he’d leave night school quick and fast if he knew.”  
  
“…Night school? I…I thought he dropped out.”  
  
She sighed, “…It’s a long story but he came back to school. In order to graduate on time with me, he has to complete his first year at night. He’ll be out around eight.”  
  
“T-That’s…that’s fantastic, Jill” he breathed, honestly…relieved? God, aside from his dad going AWOL, it sounded…like everything was going well here without him.  
  
“All right, where the _fuck_ is Koji so I can fight his ass?!”  
  
…His family home may have been too hyped up for his blood at current. Shin gazed absently as Yagami Nerimaru rounded the corner, looking pissed. Well…that was Koji’s other forte: picking fights. Shin hoped he didn’t give out too many details.  
  
Didn’t seem so, Nelly’s eyes crossed him and he recoiled. Good ol’ Koji. “… _Shin_?”  
  
Shin nodded as Nelly looked… _floored_. “…Oh my God, w-what?? Wh—oh my God, _Shin_!”  
  
Nelly hugged him at ease, gripping his shoulders, “B-Bro, wh-where the _fuck_ have you _been_?! They to—they told us you were _dead_ , what the—what the _shit?!”  
  
_ “…It’s a long story. I’m getting a little weary of telling it so, if you don’t mind waiting until Shaun and Tony get back…just know, I, uh, was lost in the desert so that’s why I look like this.”  
  
“ ‘Lost in the desert’?” Nelly echoed, “…How long have you been _here_?”  
  
“…Since about twelve.”  
  
“…Excuse _me_?”  
  
Jill shook her head, “Nii-san’s still on a mission, Nell. No one can know he’s here except family. To the world at large, he needs to remain ‘dead’. He nor us can communicate that he’s here alive which is probably why Koji was annoying you to try to get you here.”  
  
…Still on a mission. How…true. Nelly’s eyes narrowed sharply, “…So, fuck dad, right? He is a mental _disaster_ right now but the army doesn’t give two shits, huh?”  
  
“I’m working on it.”  
  
Koji walked back in, sipping a Coke. Nelly glowered back at him, drawling, “…Well, if you do the same number you did on me to get me here, you’ll get dad, no problem.”  
  
“Tuh, you’re _easy_ compared to dad. I need to get ready to put on a whole act for him.”  
  
What…? Koji reached into his pocket, pulling out his wallet, “Jill, princess, can you go get some aloe vera for Shin? I don’t think we have enough.”  
  
“Ah! Yes, of course” she nodded, taking the money he handed her.  
  
Aloe vera? Go? How? It was getting late. Shin listened to the door shut before grunting, “…How is she going anywhere?”  
  
Nelly’s brows furrowed as Koji continued to drink his soda, sighing after finishing a swig, “…Shin, stick with us here: …she’s sixteen. She’s driving now.”  
  
…Oh. Oh yea. Dropping back against the couch, wide-eyed, he slowly shook his head, “…I…I feel like I…I just dropped off the face of the planet and now I’m coming back with no idea about… _anything_ now.”  
  
“I can understand that” Nelly assured.  
  
…Could he? Koji’s eyes cut toward the kitchen before coming over to get into a closer huddle. “…Nell, we’re going to have to help Shin out. Don’t ask too many stupid questions, I just need you to come home on Saturday all day until this ‘top secret shit’ is over so we can watch out for him.”  
  
“All right” Nelly nodded slowly.  
  
…His family was always a team, no matter how he looked at it. Swallowing, Shin whispered, “T-Thanks, both of you.”  
  
Nelly looked…apprehensive, “…This is going to really eat me alive, you know that, right?”  
  
“Just chill” Koji stretched, “He’ll know before the night is over. Relax though, man. You want another puff?”  
  
Making a face, Shin muttered, “…No. I can possibly doze more comfortably knowing you two are here anyway. I don’t want to become…immune to that magic.”  
  
The dynamic duo nodded and walked into the kitchen, their voices chatting with their mother as he resumed his position on the couch. To say he felt…good about this would be a straight up lie.   
  
But…he did have a lot of people that had his back, didn’t he? His mother was right that he was blessed in that much.  
  
…People had his back. He…needed to maintain his own mind.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _“That’s FUCKING BULLSHIT.”  
  
_ …Once again he was reminded that five siblings was literally just a different kind of warzone.   
  
“Will you keep your fucking voice down, you overemotional little shit?” Koji countered whomever made the initial proclamation, “I don’t think fucking _Russia_ heard you.”  
  
“He’s not _wrong_ , futago…” Nelly drawled.  
  
“I didn’t say he was _wrong_ ; I said he was _loud with emotion_. Shin is trying to sleep.”  
  
Jill was sitting on the floor nearest to him, based on tonality as he hadn’t opened his eyes yet to reveal they woke him up, something he’d have to explain to Koji was a big ‘no-no’. Well, he’d…probably have had to work to reach her and Koji probably had ample time to punch him into the ground if he tried it. Okay. Their sister sounded upset, “It’s really _not fair_ though, Koji. To Shin or papa. W-What if he died out there?”  
  
“…I mean, at least that seems moot though, right?” said…someone. It sounded like maybe Shaun.  
  
“It might _not_ have been though!” Jill huffed.  
  
“Yea!” barked the initial loud one. Must be Tony… “And after almost getting killed and shot at like he was some fucking target, they tell him to stay hidden inside?! His life was on the line for _months_ , how dare they ask him to keep not living it?!”  
  
…Mm. Koji sounded…calm, “Again…don’t disagree with any of you right now. However, I am asking you to do this _for Shin_. I don’t know…what the hell was going on in the desert that he knows that other people can’t know that he’s alive, it doesn’t make a shit bit of sense to _me_. But—BUT, he returned to us _alive_ after being missing or otherwise assumed dead. And he has requested that we keep his existence a secret until he gets word he can ‘live again’. So that means we have to go on, _pretending_ , to be sad and hoping our dad wants to return to this house he pays for to see he doesn’t need to be sad anymore for real without us saying anything. I want us to keep _calm,_ help him recover, and for all he’s done, _keep his request_. Are we collectively good to do that or do I have to lock some people in the basement?”  
  
…Shaun, possibly, assured, “For Shin, I can keep the secret.”  
  
“Of course” Jill agreed.  
  
That damn Tony, he didn’t chime in at all. That kid… “…I…I really didn’t think he’d come back.”  
  
“I know” Koji murmured.  
  
“…All right. We…were given a second chance and…and that’s the most important part so I’ll do it for Shin, even though I don’t like it.”  
  
Tony… “Ah! Nii-san, I’m sorry, did we wake you?”  
  
Oops. Shin blinked wearily, bleary eyed for multiple reasons as he sat up. Shaun came into his vision first, “Nii-san…this is so awesome. You’re like-like a superhero or something for this.”  
  
“Tch…hardly” Shin smiled as he hugged the youngest. His hair was very…oddly cut very long over one eye. He did look…taller and older too.  
  
Tony’s blond hair, still a bit browner than Jill’s was cut shorter but he also looked like a full-grown damn man, maybe just several centimeters shorter than Koji and Nelly. He was awkwardly rubbing his arm, seeming offstandish as he stared down. Jill sulked, swatting at him, “Baka.”  
  
“…H-Hey, nii-san.”  
  
“Hey, Tony.”  
  
“I…I’m glad you’re okay. Really. And there’s…there’s a lot of things from before that I’m…I’m sorry for and wish…wish went different. I’m…I’m just glad that…that wasn’t the way it ended” he whispered.  
  
“Don’t sweat it, itoto” Shin grimaced, standing to hug him, “…I think I’m…about to have some growing pains myself. I get it.”  
  
“Shin…” he whispered, hugging him almost shyly.  
  
Well…this was an extremely nice homecoming for him to receive. If…if only they knew he didn’t deserve a second of it. Shaun frowned at his legs, shaking his head, “Shin…what happened out there?”  
  
… “Oi, oi” Nelly grunted, standing up, “Don’t bug him about stuff like that. Let’s just be glad he’s here. C’mon, let’s help mama make the plates.”  
  
Younger Shaun would have sulked about being cutoff from his curiosities but…well, fifteen-year-old Shaun nodded, giving him an apologetic look, before going into the kitchen.   
  
…It…it wasn’t like…he wouldn’t talk about it. He just…didn’t want them to see the truth this soon.  
  
Yagami Dana entered the room, pulling on gloves, “All right, Sweetie Plum, let’s change out the packing.”  
  
“Mama, I…I can. It’s gross…”  
  
“How will you reach the back of your legs?” she sulked, “Lie down.”  
  
Yeesh. He found himself smirking when _all_ of the younger siblings popped back in the room like they teleported, Nelly calling from the kitchen ‘oi!’. Dana also leered at them as they came behind, looking mystified. “…This is not some spectacle, you lot.”  
  
“It’s…it’s fine, mama. They can see” Shin murmured.  
  
Nelly came back in with his arms crossed, Koji sitting on the other end of the sofa from what he could see in his peripheral. His mother unwrapped the bandages before removing the gauze. He tried not to grimace when he heard inhales and Jill gasp loudly. His mom was right, he would have really struggled to do this himself. He hadn’t…really seen them but it was described as deep craters in his leg. He was really confused why they didn’t just…sew them up or something or how he hadn’t taken muscle or ligament damage. The doctor was lackadaisical so it was possible but he just said ‘pack them’…  
  
“…Holy shit” Shaun rasped.  
  
Mama just worked diligently as he imagined his siblings were just gawking behind him. She covered them back up, wrapped them in gauze, and redid his bandages before disposing of the gloves, standing. It was a little…scary how stolid his mom was about this stuff sometimes. Like the colonel said back when he completed training, she could have easily been a soldier. She wrapped up the bag, kissing his temple, “Come eat so I can get you plumped back up.”  
  
Nodding softly, sitting back up, he lightly glanced over his shoulder. God, Jill was back in tears and Tony and Shaun look mortified. It appeared Nelly and Koji had gone off to the deck to light up a cigarette. He was proud he was only a third provoked to join them, he…didn’t need a habit like that right now or ever again.  
  
He sighed when he stumbled trying to get up and Shaun and Tony quickly came to help. “Thanks…really, it…just kind of hurts.”  
  
He said, lying. It hurt like hell. And his once young naïve siblings looked completely in disbelief so he just sighed again. He…wasn’t sure what to tell them except that he came close to dying but…  
  
Shin smiled as his mom put a full spread before him. Well, a full spread with small portions of a lot of his favorite meals. Mama knew. Koji and Nelly meandered in to sit down after washing their hands, silent. Jeez, he wanted to eat in some kind of joy since they were…almost all together.  
  
“So…how is everyone?” Shin drawled, picking up his chopsticks.  
  
Shaun’s dark eyes blinked very slowly. “…Good?”  
  
“Okay…”  
  
Koji finally smirked, picking up his bowl of rice, “You’ll forgive us if our lives seem far less…titillating than the guy that came back from the ‘dead’, Shin.”  
  
“Seriously” snorted Nelly.  
  
Great. His mom sat down, sighing, “I am certain Shin is in no mood to keep talking about something so fresh, you all. Unless he wants to.”  
  
“…I really don’t, mama.” Not…not right now. “But, really. I heard you went back to school, Tony. That’s…that’s excellent.”  
  
Tony looked a little alarmed, having been picking at his food, “O-Oh…yea. I…I mean, it’s all work so it ended up being whatever.”  
  
Jill stuck out her tongue at him, wiping at her still damp eyes, “Tsundere ass.”  
  
Hmm? Tony made a face but grumbled, “…I went back really meaning to go temporarily but I kind of found I really like chemistry, so…I guess one class will keep me entertained.”  
  
“That’s nice, Tony, for real…I’m happy for you. I’m glad you found purpose in something.”  
  
“Thanks, Shin…”  
  
Shaun sipped his miso as Shin looked to him. “…You…still like robots?”  
  
“Eh.”  
  
Okay. Setting his bowl down, Shaun nodded, “I’ve been getting into industrial and mechanical engineering. There’s this little side club I go to after school and I’ve been building another motorcycle. Not to replace Kamex or anything but to see how I can improve.”  
  
Crap, Kamex. “Is Kamex still running…?”  
  
“Of course” Shaun huffed.  
  
Rather suddenly, every single person at the table got this weird look on their face, like a universal ‘oh shit’ ran through everyone’s head. Wha…? Koji and their mom exchanged a look, almost like…who was going to tell him? Shin glowered, “…Just tell me.”  
  
“…Yea, so…dad had this weird…moment of just…” Koji started before stopping, looking blank, “…Okay, we managed to save your room but your car and bike are gone, man.”  
  
…He wasn’t sentimental. Not after being out in the middle of nowhere where none of his material items helped him one damn bit. No, he easily became very detached to possessions out there. Nonetheless…he would once again be lying if he said he didn’t want to scream ‘what the fuck do you mean?!’.  
  
Gaping wordlessly at them instead as they all looked…perturbed, Nelly drawled, “…You…you can use my…my car when you can…drive again.”  
  
Shin bit his lip, setting his chopsticks down. “…I…appreciate that, Nelly. However…how… _gone_ are we talking?”  
  
Tony smiled nervously, “…Uh, nii-san, they actually…discontinued making the Supra model this year so, um…I think it sat on the dealer lot for an hour before someone snatched it up.”  
  
Covering his mouth with his hands, he tried to…digest. That car…held at least a few _good_ memories which he would have liked to have…maintained it for. And now…it was not only sold immediately to some strange person, apparently it was about to become _rare_ meaning he wouldn’t be able to buy it back. Dana scratched the top of her head, groaning, “…What is with him and rare cars?”  
  
“…It’s just a thing. Things don’t matter. I…can get another car and…potentially another bike” Shin breathed, calming himself.  
  
“That’s real good, onii-san” Shaun praised, “Fuck stuff.”  
  
“Shaun” Dana leered.  
  
God knows he wanted to see his dad. His dad hadn’t wanted this at all. This? This was his absolute fear of what could happen to Shin and for two months he had to live with that. Yagami Yamada raised him to protect him from all harm. It…it had only been them for a chunk of time there. Shin…Shin was his baby.  
  
But apparently, Shin wasn’t the only one that had been going off the deep end.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _“Hello…is this Yagami Yamada?”  
  
“Yes, this is he.”  
  
“Hello, Yagami-san. My name is Colonel Teramoto Ken, I’m calling from the Armed Services. I’m sorry, sir, but I…I’m calling to inform you that Yagami Shin is missing in action. He was completing a supply run and the last tracking of the plane had them over water. At this time, we have not been able to locate a body. I apologize for your loss.”  
  
_Loss.  
  
Yagami Yamada stood in the hospital where he’d worked since a little after his first son was born, leaning against the counter at the nurse’s station. He’d been off for hours, Matsushima commanding that he just ‘go home’. Go home to…what? An apology?  
  
His friends told him he damned his son with the name ‘Shin’ when he was an infant. He haughtily told them his son would do so great at life, they’d be amazed or something. And they were, they called him in droves to tell him his son was a ‘hero’ or something that was supposed to be nice given he met the same exact fate as his namesake: he was dead.  
  
It crossed his mind for 48 hours after that call to go jump off of a bridge. Izumi Craig, a friend from that time that didn’t die, kept calling and saying he was having him trailed to be tranquilized if he even attempted. ‘Shin would want you to take care of his mother and siblings’.  
  
How the hell did he know what Shin would want? Everyone always had some convenient psychic link with what the dead would want after they were gone. But what could he say? It sounded good. It sounded like his son. His son…had been a good person up until the end. If nothing else, _his_ Shin…died doing the right thing.  
  
And he tried to go home where his wife still had that misguided faith she had in the last Shin that he would come back, something she had managed to bestow in Koji, a son that should also have no hope in anything, ironically. The rest of his children were like him: facts were facts. Faith was as duplicitous as ever.  
  
If that wasn’t enough, Shin’s things were still there like he was coming back to them. His car that Yamada proudly bought him because they’d made it. They’d made it _out_ of Wasaba and he could afford to get his son a brand new fancy car. It didn’t take any extra concerted effort or skipping meals; he got that for his son because they made it. His son…helped him make it through…only to not make it.  
  
He got mad because all of his children stopped him from trying to remove the memory. Why? Dana and he had done it before, why couldn’t they do it again? He got away with the car but Nelly and Koji installed keylocks on the doors to Shin’s room…like he wouldn’t have knocked those barriers down. Whatever. He didn’t…didn’t need to be a part of any of it. Right now.  
  
Eventually, he’d have to go back. Reintegrate. He still had five children. A rich amount of children, a majority.   
  
…Why did losing the one feel like his heart had been hollowed out?  
  
Shaking his head, he started to head for the bunkroom. Not tonight, then. Matsushima came up today, glaring, _“…I didn’t really think you were one to think only one person in your family matters, Yagami. I’m a little disappointed.”  
  
_ They _all_ mattered. But he lost…he lost…his stronghold. Shin David Yagami, with that…that weird middle name Dana insisted they try to implement, was one of the only reasons he was standing here now and…and he was gone?  
  
Yamada frowned when his cell phone suddenly rang. Honestly, he never wanted to answer another phone call again. Taking it out of his pocket, he frowned to find it was Koji. As much as he liked to say Koji was his mother’s child, the boy actually did take a little too much after him. He…he knew there was no reasoning with Yamada right now no matter how much everyone wanted to. This was probably the second time he’d called Yamada in a month. A little odd too that it was midnight…  
  
Answering, he murmured, “Hello…?”  
  
“Dad, come quick, something’s wrong with mom!!”  
  
Koji hung up and Yamada’s heart was ringing in every square inch of his body. No. No, he…he could…hover through life like a zombie without Shin.  
  
He lost one of his strongholds. One.   
  
But if he… _ever_ lost her…  
  
Yamada _sprinted_ out of the hospital, leaving some very alarmed nurses in his wake. Scrambling to find his keys, he booted up his car, having not really driven in two weeks, and gunned it out almost recklessly into traffic. No, stop it. Get to _her_ alive, you dumbass.  
  
However, he was definitely speeding, turning his twenty minute commute into ten. Screeching tires as he pulled into the yard, he belted out of the car. That…suspicious side of him that came from growing up in a bad neighborhood couldn’t help note that Koji’s car was nowhere in sight. That…that might mean she wasn’t here either but he needed to survey the situation.  
  
Running into the house, he looked around, panting, “Dana?!”  
  
God, no. No, why did you hate him so much? It was dark downstairs. Running up the steps, he rushed to the master suite. “Dana?!”  
  
When he entered the room, he could barely swallow, finding his wife stretched out rather limply on the bed. No. No. Barreling to her side, he quickly checked her pulse. “Dana? Dana, can you hear me? Dana!”  
  
…Her…her pulse actually sounded really good? The woman’s eyes slowly opened after a moment. Staring up at him groggily for a moment, Dana suddenly rapidly shot up. “Yama.”  
  
…She looked pretty good and damn alert to him. Staring at her, he bit his lip and closed his eyes, feeling his panic replacing rather quickly with rage. Dana was delighted, “Yama, oh my God, you’re home. You’re finally home.”  
  
“…Yes.”  
  
“Wh-What made you come home?” she breathed.  
  
“…Your maybe soon to be dead son.” Or at least Koji was getting a _crack over the head_.

Dana shook her head rapidly. She was…so damn _spirited_. How? How could she possibly be this… _happy_? That was a child she _carried in her body for nine months_. She would come to see Shin by taking beatings from that bastard. She loved her child so _how_?  
  
Taking his hand, she dragged him downstairs toward the third level. He dragged his heels immediately. The third level was where Shin’s rooms were. “Dana, I am _leaving_. I don’t know what Koji meant to pull doing this but I don’t have the strength for this.”  
  
“Yama--”  
  
“ _No, Dana_.”  
  
After…after _everything_ he’d been through, he didn’t have _anything left_ to even think about the fact his son was a bloated corpse in some miscellaneous ocean somewhere. He inhaled hard, covering his face as he almost collapsed. He failed…he failed Shin too. He should have tried harder to talk him out of this! How did he watch his best friend die in front of him and let his son go off to be placed in a situation to get himself killed?! Why did he _tempt fate_?  
  
Shaking hard, he tried to back away, escape. No. He had nothing…nothing left to give. An apology. All he had…was yet another…apology for not being able to save…one of the most important beings in his life…  
  
“Yamada.”  
  
Yamada uncovered his face, scorching with pain, and found Dana staring at him with resolution. When they were about to have it all but it was all snatched away, when, because of _that_ Shin, her parents showed up and gave them an ultimatum, she had this same expression. It was the exact same expression as when she told him she needed him to save her, to raise their child, to get _all of them_ back together. What had been in that expression was a faith in him that he to this day couldn’t believe. Right now…she was full of faith and he didn’t know _why_.  
  
She grasped his hands gently, kissing him with the same tenderness. He’d…be nothing without her, no matter…not matter what. “Dana…”  
  
“…I promised you I’d carry your faith. And I did. I’m just asking you believe in me for a moment.”  
  
Gulping hard, Yamada pursed his lips. Whatever. Whatever in these rooms…needed him to believe, he’d…he’d do it for her, at least. Nodding once, he allowed her to hold his hand and lead him to the door where his son once slept behind. It had been locked for months now.  
  
…However, now there was a dull hum, it sounded like a television. Dana softly knocked for some reason before opening the door.  
  
Nelly was asleep at the end of the bed for some reason, Jill, Tony, and Shaun draped across it as well. He was prepared to give Koji a mouthful but…he wasn’t there. There…was someone though, with long hair, brown at the bottom, a faded goldenrod at the top. They had dark, burnt, damaged skin and their arms appeared rather tensed but were pure muscle, no real fat. They were just sitting up, gazing at the television. Who the hell?  
  
Turning their face, Yamada was confused to meet blue eyes that looked as familiar as his own. Who was this?  
  
“…Papa.”  
  
…Papa? What? Dana suddenly nudged him forward. No, who the hell was this? Who the hell was this with all of his children sleeping around them that called him ‘papa’?  
  
Whoever…whoever it was smiled. “…Sorry, dad. I…I told you I’d come back to you though, right? Better…late than never… right?”  
  
What? _What?_ “Yama” Dana glowered, “It’s Shin. It’s our _son_.”  
  
He pulled back, rapidly shaking his head. Impossible. They’d been had. That wasn’t his son. Nothing in this universe would _grace_ him with his son showing up not in a body bag after almost _three months_ of being MIA. That’s what they told him: he was _missing._ A _casualty. His son_ was somewhere at the bottom of an ocean, there was no way he was now sitting back in his bed.  
  
Dana groaned. Loudly. “You are an emotional _tsunami_. Nelly? Tony? Jill? Shaun?”  
  
The four children stirred after a few moments, sitting up. They’d been tricked. Tricked by sentiment. Dana tipped her head, drawling, “Let’s give your father and brother a moment, please.”  
  
What _brother_? What _son_? Balling his fists, he was prepared to tell Dana to stop dreaming. Instead, he was met with a mild slap against the jaw.  
  
Jarred, he yelped, looking down at his wife who looked…annoyed. “…Pull it together. You’re supposed to trust me.”  
  
The four youngers looked a little startled as Dana herded them out of the room, closing the door behind her. What…? “…Sorry, I must look really weird. I don’t think blond works on me, actually.”  
  
Yamada looked to the bed again before pushing himself to go over. It just…it simply couldn’t be. Not…not after he allowed almost seventy people to die. Not after his best friend Shin was shot twelve times then died in front of him. Not…not after _everything_ was he…he given a mercy in the war of life and death.   
  
Blood was rushing to his head as he tried to…grasp this. He was slipping because he didn’t…he couldn’t believe…choking on air, he enveloped what was a ghost not ten minutes ago in his arms and sobbed, “W-Where in the _hell have you been_?”  
  
“It’s…it’s a long story, papa…”  
  
Yamada was going to suffocate. Slamming down on the bed after letting Shin go, he gripped his sides, heaving and rocking. It couldn’t be. He was dreaming. He’d wake up somewhere and this would be a dream; a fantasy. That’s all he ever deserved _before_.   
  
“…I’m so sorry, dad. I’m so sorry.”  
  
In Wasaba, tears…were a sign of weakness. He couldn’t fight it though. Sometimes, he just gave in but it’d been a long time. He couldn’t stop the pain escaping him right now as he wept. It worked out? Did it actually for once _work out_?  
  
Sucking on air, he swiped at his face, his chest shuddering. Oh God. Oh God. “Shin— _Shin_. Y-Your colonel, he called me, h-he said that you…you had gone down into the water and they-they couldn’t find you. They considered you a _casualty_.”  
  
Shin appeared to be dragging himself to sit next to him, cringing as his knees bent. “…It was a routine supply run. We were about an hour or two from our location when…when this missile came up and ripped the front of the plane apart and killed our lieutenant. The pilot, he managed to get the plane almost landed before the Zechs took him out too. The platoon, we fought and…and took care of all of the Zechs that had crashed us but our tracking signal went out. We weren’t on the ocean, we were in the middle of the desert.”  
  
…The desert. “What…what happened? They found you?” Yamada quivered.  
  
“…Not exactly. We…we were sitting ducks in that location so I tracked that there was an old army base about 350 miles from where we were. Old bases are supposed to have a hotline maintained, even if they’re abandoned. My friend, she talked me into waiting ten days in the case that they came to rescue us. In that time, we were attacked twice by the Zechs and had out numbers cut in half. I knew…I knew I had to try so my friend Komari and I, we…we trekked out into the desert to get to the base.”  
  
“ _Damn it_ , Shin.”  
  
“Come on, dad, hear me out” he mumbled.  
  
Right…right. Whatever it was, it clearly had a happy ending. “I’m sorry, you’re right. Go on.”  
  
“So, we…we walked and walked. Along the way, we found these…these little dark metal huts. They were keeping Terrans inside of them to torture. It was…it was 120 degrees outside, it had to have been even worse in those things. But, we made it to the base. The Zechs…had cut the lines. We got ambushed by a small group there but we were able to subdue and utilize the truck they had. We walked for some hundred miles before…before Komari, she got shot trying to protect me.”  
  
“Oh, Shin…”  
  
“Just…in the leg though. I-I did everything you taught me” he suddenly shuddered, “O-Or I did the best I could--”  
  
God. Hugging his apparently _constant_ miracle, Yamada whispered, “It’s okay. What happened?”  
  
“I-I drove us in their truck then their dune buggy and when…when both of them were out of gas, I-I carried Komari against my chest because I-I wasn’t going to leave her. I-I walked for…for hundreds and hundreds of miles, until my boots were full of blood—we kept finding those damn _camps_ too. By…by the sixtieth or so day, we were down to-to one water bottle, no food, and the sun—God, the sun, it was…it was killing us. I didn’t…didn’t notice that we had managed to run up right next to a Zechs building. They…they shot at us and-and I got shot in the legs. Three in each—I got shot in the shoulder twice earlier.”  
  
… _Twelve gun shots_. Yamada gazed in amazement as Shin trembled in his arms. His son…also got shot twelve times. Instead though… “…I don’t even know what it was, dad. Maybe that fortune you drew. But out of nowhere—like, literal nowhere, my colonel landed. They were just doing a retrieval mission. They saved us. We-we went back to the camp, everyone but three people had been killed. Papa, out…out of a hundred people, only _five of us_ survived and I was one of them. _One of five_.”  
  
…A statistical impossibility. Holding his first born, his baby, Yamada didn’t…didn’t even know how to believe this. Could he…? Kissing the top of Shin’s head, he squeezed his eyes shut, the burning indicating he was about to start crying again. “…I’ll take it, Shin. I’ll take it. Your…your friend? She made it though?”  
  
“…She lost the leg. They said the damage was too severe.”  
  
“But…not her life?”  
  
“ _No_. But you…you don’t understand, she lost that leg because of _me_. She now has to go through life just-just _imbalanced.”  
  
_ …Hmm. “…Don’t you fret over that, all right? Was it the whole leg?”  
  
“N-No, just the lower, but--”  
  
“That means whatever you did kept the infection from spreading. Infection that could have gone straight to her brain over the amount of time she wasn’t treated at a hospital and killed her. You did what you told me you were out there to do: you helped her.”  
  
Shin looked startled as Yamada pet his hair back. He looked…so grizzled and worn. He looked like he’d seen years of suffering…or inflicted it. Yamada smiled for the first time in months. That didn’t matter.  
  
“Let me see these gunshots.”  
  
“Oh, dad…”  
  
Yamada grunted, “ _Now_. I don’t trust a military hospital wouldn’t allow your legs to fall off.”  
  
Sulky, Shin stretched out on his stomach as Yamada undid the taping. It looked a few hours old per the bleeding. “…Your mom do this?”  
  
“Mm, she’s been very diligently packing and treating the wounds all day.”  
  
…All day? Yamada stared up briefly. Wait a minute. “…Well, c’mon, I’m going to take you to the hospital so I can close these up and get you treated with antibiotics. Leaving them open like this will only leave you more open to infection.”  
  
“Oh…yea, I missed a part, dad. I…actually can’t do that.”  
  
“Stop fooling around, Shin. C’mon, I’ll help you.”  
  
“Damn, pop, will you just listen for a second?”  
  
Yamada glared sharply back as Yagami Koji entered the room, holding three beers. “Well, hello, Mr. ‘Something’s Wrong With Mom’. Was that _before_ or _after_ your beer run?”  
  
Shin groaned, looking to Koji. “…I’m tired of explaining, Koji, and you put it pretty…efficiently.”  
  
What? “Sure thing. Dad, Shin found some shit in the desert that lets the army get a one up on those Zechs’ bastards. They are, alas, unaware that our army knows about these locations because Shin was apparently very efficient at what he does. For whatever reason, they fear the Zechs will correlate Shin mysteriously not being dead with infiltrating their camps and perhaps move them. Thus, they have requested Shin and the other four come home and remain dead to the general population until they can move in.”  
  
“…I’m sorry, what?” Yamada blinked rapidly.  
  
“The reason we did not call and report to you immediately that Shin was alive is because we are not allowed to communicate over any airways that Shin is alive. He cannot leave this home until the army tells him they have completed the mission and he is, essentially, still an active duty soldier right now” Koji nodded.  
  
“…How long were you in the hospital after that, Shin?” Yamada said lowly.  
  
“…Um, three days.”  
  
But still _all the corruption_. “You…were out in the elements, starving, injured, and _dehydrated_ for _sixty plus days_ with six _open bullet wounds_ …and they sent you home…after _three days_ and tell you you can’t go anywhere for…estimated _how long_?”  
  
“…Three months.”  
  
Great. Now to go fight the whole army. Yamada managed to hide his ticking jaw as he kneaded his temples, “…All right. All right. I…guess I will treat the trauma here.”  
  
“I can go rob a medical store for stuff if it helps” Koji offered rather casually.  
  
Yamada turned to look at him, often wondering…what exactly went through this boy’s head sometimes because _what_? “… _No_. I…think I can manage the medical supply portion without you breaking the law but thanks for your willingness.”  
  
Shin looked…absolutely drained. Probably because his body was still trying to fight _everything_ it just went through. And…possibly because of those other parts he didn’t tell him. Stroking his hair back, Yamada murmured, “…Your mama kept telling me not to give up on you, Shin. She’s…she’s so good at that, that not giving up. Even after all these years, she’s…she’s still having to convince me and she’s pretty much always right. I…I’m so happy. I-I can’t believe it, but I’m just-just so happy…”  
  
“…Me too, papa. I…I hope I don’t disappoint you.”

…Eh? Shin looked dazed. Yamada frowned. He…typically always thought of physical trauma first but three days…he got not one lick of mental help either.   
  
…One fight at a time. When he showed up to this house, in Yamada’s head his firstborn, his baby that he held in his arms every night when he was a newborn, was a corpse. Now, he…he had his miracle back.  
  
And just maybe a little faith too.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
 _“…Papa. DAD. You are—you are definitely ignoring how this was supposed to work.”  
  
Shin was so tired when Nelly and Koji helped him up the steps. Alas, his siblings wanted to stay by him and ended up falling asleep. Because of that, he…he couldn’t. No, not…not without them being protected. Koji was also not keeping with how this work, he mysteriously said ‘be right back’ and left. So, struggling, Shin stayed awake.  
  
About fifteen minutes later though? Yagami Yamada walked through the door.  
  
Everyone else had recognized him instantly. His dad though? He reacted mentally. Who is this crazy looking guy in my son’s bed? His dad had him dead and gone and anything that countered that, that…was probably a trick.  
  
His mom whacked the man a bit, telling him essentially to snap out of it but if only it were that easy. He’d have her slap him too. Somehow though, his dad did come over, confirming…before just breaking down. God, he…he probably almost killed his dad.  
  
Shin felt a little more comfortable getting into more detail with his dad and Koji. Maybe because they seemed less…affected somehow, or at least knew where he was coming from. Somewhat. He didn’t get gritty though, he…he didn’t want to tell his dad there were a couple days where he exploded someone’s brain all over his uniform.  
  
His dad left after a little bit, Koji relaxing on a mattress he dragged in. While Shin was half-possessed to be concerned about Koji too, he just…felt a little better if it was him there. But, well, he suspected his dad might want to stay too when he got back from wherever he went.  
  
And wherever he went was the hospital to apparently bring MATSUSHIMA, his BOSS and a NON-RELATIVE, back to the house. Shin fucked up…in his first 24 hours.  
  
Matsushima stared at him, carrying a huge box as was his father who kept exiting and returning with more stuff. “…Far be it from me to over compliment but you all are made of some spectacular stuff.”  
  
“Only the best” Koji yawned.  
  
Yea, great, still, cover blown. Matsushima scoffed as he started to unpack whatever they had. “Son, if you went into the desert, leaving us to think you were dead so your dad could act like a borderline psychopath but came back and needed us to help you complete your mission, I wouldn’t tell a soul even if it was to save my own mother.”  
  
“…I mean, I’d…make some considerations THERE, Matsushima, damn” Shin echoed, a little alarmed.  
  
Yamada came in, rushing, “C’mon, Matsushima, these wounds have been open way too long.”  
  
Shin groaned as he was hedged to lie on his stomach after they draped the bed in clean linen, isolating the wounds with some kind of plastic. Matsushima gripped his finger with the pulse ox and pressed a stethoscope to his arm to check his blood pressure. He gazed off for a moment before slowly pulling away…then retaking it. “…Yagami.”  
  
Yamada walked up, taking his stethoscope off, and repeated the process as well…before groaning loudly, burying his face in his hands. “This is ridiculous!”  
  
What?! Matsushima just sighed. “Let’s just do what we can, Yagami…”  
  
“He needs to be in a hospital with machines I can use to check him over. Here, he might as well be in hospice!”  
  
“Drama queen” Matsushima droned, going back to their supplies, “Shin, your blood pressure is…scary low right now, son. I’m going to go out on a limb and diagnose septicemia, dehydration, and blood loss. Unless your father has something dramatic he wants to add.”  
  
“He could die” Yamada hissed.  
  
“Well, there you go.”  
  
Shin found himself smirking. These two together were always kind of funny. “…I didn’t have a transfusion at the hospital, to my recollection. I have discharge papers in my bag. Koji?”  
  
His younger brother went to his things, rummaging, before coming out with a stack of paper. Handing it to their dad, the man’s light blue eyes darkened like storm clouds. Uh… “…So they…just sedated you for several days and removed the bullets…and hydrated.”  
  
Oops. Matsushima flipped through the records, whistling, “…Well, my diagnosis isn’t ‘death’ like your father but it definitely wouldn’t have been ‘send his ass home’ with these lab results.”  
  
Yamada was looking right…pissed right now. Matsushima shook his head, “…Let’s get a transfusion going and fluids with a Claforan bag. We’ll sew up these holes in his legs unless we see infection and then put him on a mild sedative and some oxygen for the night. Fair?”  
  
“…Fair.”  
  
Shin was a little concerned now. As far as he knew, Komari didn’t have a doctor at home. Of course, it sounded like that one doctor had total control and was negligent with him because of Kasumi. He wondered…if that little nurse had helped the best she could. She definitely took a risk for him to see Komari. Biting his lip as his dad injected the line into his forearm, he whispered, “…Do…do either of you know what would happen to a nurse that was rightfully going against the doctor’s orders in the army?”  
  
“Nothing good, I can tell you that” Matsushima said absently, drawing something into a syringe.  
  
…Damn. Felt like…he was screwing a lot of people over lately.  
  
_“Has our house really always been this fucking boring?”  
  
Shin opened his eyes, finding Yagami Koji sitting in a chair in front of his television, flipping channels. “…Maybe you’re just spoiled.”  
  
“Oh, sorry, man, I wasn’t trying to wake you.”  
  
Shaking his head, he stared up at the intravenous fluids dripping into his body slowly. Honestly, because of the anesthesia Matsushima gave him last night and apparently oxygen he hadn’t been aware he lacked, he slept like a baby. He…was really hoping Komari was okay.   
  
“I wasn’t sleeping too heavy…” he mumbled, “…I’m surprised dad’s not in here.”  
  
As he suspected, his dad actually curled up into bed with him after he and Matsushima finished. He would have worried more if he wasn’t almost in a coma. Alas, he…supposed his dad wouldn’t be too threatened by him, maybe.   
  
“Oh, he and mama were all giddy a couple hours ago. I had to remind them you’re ‘dead’ but I’m pretty sure they’re going to celebrate amongst themselves.”  
  
“ ‘Celebrate amongst themselves’? The hell does that…”  
  
… “ _Eww_?”  
  
Koji smirked dryly, “I think they went for a _walk_ , perv. Though, given dad’s been AWOL for three months, that might be on the agenda too.”  
  
Sulking, Shin sat up and glanced at his old alarm clock. 11…”So the kids went to school?”  
  
“Yea, Nelly went back early this morning too.”  
  
“…This is probably going to be the weirdest question I can potentially have given my absence. There’s probably more…pertinent things, just…what is the deal with the shaggy hair?”  
  
Jill _kind of_ had it, Tony _kind of_ had it, but Shaun? Shaun had some crazy bangs and it seemed weirdly deliberate. His brother snickered, stopping on a random Japanese sitcom, “Yea, that’s a…tough one to explain. It’s slowly becoming the rage right now.”  
  
“…Shaggy hair?”  
  
“Emo.”  
  
Emo? “…Emu?”  
  
“E _mo_.”  
  
…Okay. Koji kicked his way around to turn to him, “It’s…a movement _kind of_ like grunge, I guess? They have emo bands and this specific emo style.”  
  
“…What are the bands?”  
  
“Oh, it’s devasting, I can’t stand it” Koji nodded. “They got like…Dashboard Confessional, Jimmy Eat World—" _  
  
“_ Jimmy does _what??”  
  
_ “Some of Blink-182’s stuff kind of falls in there. I can stand _them_ but ma-a-an, I cannot stand it.”  
  
…Emo. Koji’s eyes brightened, “Oh! Chris Cornell came back.”  
  
Oh! “So Soundgarden got back together?” Shin said, excited.  
  
“Uh, no. Audioslave.”  
  
…What? “It’s…basically just Chris Cornell with Rage Against the Machine. But! I got the album, I think you’ll like it. Probably…not as much as Soundgarden but it’s good.”  
  
… “…Okay.”  
  
“Foo Fighters are still going strong, Dave Grohl has some hits there.”  
  
…Hadn’t really been Shin’s cup of tea but he was happy for the former drummer of Nirvana for not losing momentum. “…Cool.”  
  
“Maynard, the lead singer of Tool, he has a side project—it’s called A Perfect Circle, it’s kind of neat.”  
  
…A Perfect…Circle. “Um, The Smashing Pumpkins broke up in 2000…still broken up. Uh…STP isn’t doing too good either. And…uh, the lead singer of Alice in Chains, he…kind of died.”  
  
“Koji” Shin said plainly.  
  
“And there’s this group called Nickelback…”  
  
“Koji. I’m going to need you to stop because I don’t know how but you just managed to depress me even more than I already am.”  
  
“Yea, it…honestly sounded better than what it actually is when it was in my head” Koji admitted, wide-eyed.  
  
Squeezing the bridge of his nose, he mumbled, “…You heard of Breaking Benjamin?”  
  
“I’m surprised _you’ve_ heard of them.”  
  
Shin got up, grabbing the IV stand to drag with him to use the restroom. “Yea…apparently it was in some Zechs’ bastard that I killed collection. I listened to it while I was racing through the desert in their vehicle.”  
  
Koji stared pensively. “…Is everything you say now going to be slightly grim and dark?”  
  
“Yes.”  
  
God. Even though they probably _shouldn’t_ have, they at least let him bathe at the military hospital. He was forbidden until his wounds healed more here. After relieving himself, he rinsed his face, staring into the mirror. Still…wasn’t sure what he was seeing.  
  
“Shin, I know how trauma works, especially in our family but…just know, I’m here to talk to if you need to” Koji offered when he returned, “I probably won’t cure your depression but, y’know, I’d rather know where you’re at than be in the dark trying to figure it out.”  
  
“…Thanks.”  
  
Koji smirked, probably because he knew he was going to be a hardass about it. No, he…just didn’t want to think about it and he definitely didn’t want to put that on _Koji,_ of all people. Not…not when Shin couldn’t provide the same for him.  
  
“Yo-o-o, let me go get a pizza from Ruby’s and some milkshakes. We haven’t gone in like a year” Koji suddenly seemed inspired.  
  
“Sure, I am…hungry.” He…had had to teach himself not to listen to that hunger so now it was…a little hard to assess what comfortable pangs were.  
  
Nodding, Koji advised he should sit downstairs. Maybe. He…wouldn’t really mind lying in bed for three months either. Alas, his younger brother helped him downstairs to the couch before going out the door. Koji was going to struggle with this, he’d never been a homebody…  
  
Using the IV stand once more as a brace, he wandered to the deck door to stare out. He looked at the blue sky as it warped from azure to lavender, warping, waving, pulling him in. It was strange how that invitation to death was slightly comforting.  
  
“Shin! You’re not supposed to be moving!”  
  
Oh boy. Shin looked to the side where his dad marched over, looking peeved. Jeez. “…That might be a little difficult for me, dad.”  
  
“It’s not a _suggestion,_ Shin. Those wounds bust open, we’re back at square one.”  
  
Meh. His mama smiled, handing him…ah! “Is that cereal, mommy?”  
  
“I wanted to make sure you had a little bit of your favorite thing, Sweetie Plum.”  
  
God, don’t…don’t let him hurt his mama. She kissed his cheek, tilting her head, “Just stretch out and eat a bowl of cereal so your dad doesn’t have a stroke.”  
  
Shin chuckled as Yamada sulked, nodding and easing himself back over to the couch. It was so soft. While he was in his coma-like sleep, it struck him that his mattress? It was so soft. The couch too. It was so…comfortable compared to the dusty ground.  
  
Sometimes the sand got in the sleeping bag if he even managed to sleep in the thing. It was gritty, biting, hot. It kept him alive because it was one of many reasons he couldn’t rest. Now, he…was supposed to be able to rest…on these soft fucking couches and beds…  
  
“Shin, are you okay?”  
  
Jumping, rattled back, he smiled at his mother who posed the question. Or he tried. “A-Ah, what do you mean?”  
  
“Well, your expression…never mind. You must be hungry” Dana nodded.  
  
“Oh, Koji went to get a pizza from that place we went as kids.”  
  
His dad sat beside him, pursing his lips, “…You need proteins to help heal the wounds, Shin. Plus, per your results, your body is depleted of a lot of key nutrients you’re not going to get out of pizza or Cinnamon Toast Crunch.”  
  
“Will you stop being a nag?” Dana snorted, swatting at her husband, “I will cook a protein packed dinner for Shin. I think pizza with probably the _ungodly_ amount of meat Koji likes to get will be fine for lunch.”  
  
“Fine.”  
  
Shin smiled thankfully at his mom as she patted his head before departing, his dad looking grouchy. “…So you guys just intend to make me feel like a petty worrywart.”  
  
With a soft laugh, Shin shook his head, “Someone has to worry, dad.”  
  
Yamada’s eyes quirked, drawling, “Well, I’m…I’m good at that.”  
  
Tapping his thigh, his dad cleared his throat, “…Once this is over, you should call Ayame. She’s in shambles.”  
  
Grimacing, Shin nodded slowly, “…I can imagine. I…I’m sure I’ve worried all of you immensely.”  
  
Yamada shook his head, “…I’d be lying if I said I’m a hundred percent believing I’m sitting here next to you right now, son. I just…can’t believe in miracles like that.”  
  
“I’m sure it’s difficult to after what happened to Yaya’s brother” Shin mumbled, leaning back and blinking away his demons.  
  
His dad leaned over and folded his hands, tapping his thumbs against his chin. The man seemed to be musing before shaking his head again slowly, “…Honestly? I’m more mystified now. That Shin…got murdered by his own acts in a concrete jungle. He got…absolutely nowhere in life. At all. Didn’t even want to, created _all_ of his obstacles, all of his enemies. But my son also throws himself into danger and lives after almost three months in an actual wilderness with hundreds of enemies.”  
  
“I wasn’t alone.”  
  
“…Yea. Guess that is my fault.”  
  
Shin’s eyes widened as his father looked a little forlorn. Oh. Oh no. “I-I mean, dad, God, you had no reason to stand by that guy—he would have gotten you killed. Mom needed you—we needed you. A-And, y’know, Komari did…did crack on me a few times.”  
  
…Though she…never didn’t have his back until she was solid out of bullets to do so. But still, that…Yamada nodded, “Well…I probably would have cracked more than a few times, Shin. That temperature? Walking across solid sand with nothing to eat and trying to ration water? You…did something immense.”  
  
“…Maybe.”  
  
Yamada stretched, sitting back, “…Anyway, as _much_ as I would love to just take a year off to be with you after this, Shin, there is…no possible way that wouldn’t raise every red flag in the universe to the hospital staff.”  
  
Snickering, Shin shook his head, “You’re raising like ten just taking off today, papa. I bet you booked it out of there when Koji called with that mama spiel.”  
  
“Yea. That brother of yours…” Yamada droned, “Just a wildcard. He knew exactly how to get me here. He’ll have to try harder next time though.”  
  
“I accept that challenge.”  
  
Shin looked up as Koji appeared, carrying two boxes of pizza and a tray of drinks. With a snort, Shin shook his head, “Hopefully there is no ‘next time’. I don’t think I can go for ‘Round 2’ on ultimate survivor.”  
  
Koji set the boxes on the table, going back to the kitchen. Their mother came in with plates and started doling out pieces, humming. “Joe-chan called us last month to issue his condolences. And I believe…Aden did as well? And Sonja. And one young man I never met. Louis?”  
  
Yamada nodded, “Yes, it got around to Wasaba and I guess it somehow got to Roller’s daughter. She sent us a card.”  
  
…Oh wow, Nesha too? But what about…

Koji returned, sitting on the recliner before handing over a newspaper. Eh? Shin looked at the paper, folded open to ‘local news’. Uncertain when the last time he looked at a newspaper, he…was something to see himself looking back. _Yagami Shin (21) of Subami was declared missing in action by the Armed Forces after a routine supply mission did not arrive at Idra Base. At this time, crash debris have not been located and is suspected to have gone down into the Mediterranean Sea._  
  
…Wow. Yamada leered, taking it from him, “This is moot now.”  
  
“It’s…something” Shin murmured, taking a plate as his mom handed it to him. “Did…”  
  
… “Did what?” Koji questioned, nodding in thanks as their mom handed him a plate next.  
  
“…Nothing.”  
  
…Did…did she…call? Or…or was the music he grew up with not the only thing that had faded away?  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
“Nii-san…”  
  
Day…Day 4. He was counting down at home now too, huh?  
  
Yagami Shin looked up, stretched out in his mother’s fabric room. When Shaun reached school age, their mother started to take small orders and worked out of this room until she secured a store front for her business, Yagada. It had mostly gone untouched for years, this room, but he noticed that she was still…here. He’d wandered by, still rebelling against his dad’s decree to ‘stay still’ and had to ask why she didn’t go back to Yagada now. He…was back. The woman just smiled.  
  
 _“I told my workers I wasn’t coming back until my baby came back. You’re not back yet.”  
  
_ Damn it, he was holding her down to keep up this mission. He felt…awful so he would sit with her. She listened to David Bowie which was nice, he seemed to recall his dad would play these albums…maybe that music reminded him of her when she was forced away. It…it sure took him back which was a bit comforting since…literally nothing else was.  
  
Today, Day 4, however, his adorable not so little sister peeked into the room. He looked to her and smiled as much as he could, “Hello, imoto. How was school?”  
  
“Oh, it was good” she assured, standing fully in the doorway.  
  
He noted she seemed to want to…ask him something which may or may not have been a good thing. “That’s good. What’s the matter though? Seems like something is on your mind.”  
  
“Well…” she drawled, rubbing her arm, “…Sort of.”  
  
Shin raised a brow as she seemed to be…reluctant. “Well, you can tell me.”  
  
Their mom was working around the dress form, suddenly smirking in Jill’s direction. Oh, she knew? Jill pouted, “Nii-san, can I fix your hair?”  
  
…Fix his hair. He stared. “…How…so?”  
  
“W-Well, I’m not skilled enough to cut it or anything!”  
  
Thank God. He…he couldn’t have anyone come near him with any sharp instruments right now. He’d attempt to trim it himself but… Jill pouted, “You have weird blond patches and, no offense, you’re a weird blond.”  
  
Oh really? He stuck out his tongue, “Sorry I’m not as pretty as you, Tony, and dad.”  
  
“That’s not it either! It’s just not…consistent.”  
  
Frankly, it was a bit weird and had only gotten weirder with his new growth. One chunk of brown at the bottom, one chunk of blond in the center, and then his roots were coming in brown again. His hair looked like a bumblebee. “Well, I wouldn’t mind but I dunno how you’d fix it, Jilly…”  
  
“I can do it!” she said confidently.  
  
“Jill is our local hair colorist” Dana droned, sticking a pin in the sleeve of the cream colored gown.  
  
Looking at her watch, she nodded, “Shaun wanted me to bleach and color some of his hair blue so I’ll get some color for you while I’m there. Be right back!”  
  
Shin stared after her, blank. “…Blue, huh?”  
  
Dana sighed, leaning over to pull the hem, standing back to look over her work. “As with most of you all’s trends, I don’t get it but more power to ya’…”  
  
With a snicker, Shin leaned back and closed his eyes.

_Still don't know what I was waiting for and my time was running wild, a million dead-end streets. And  
every time I thought I'd got it made, it seemed the taste was not so sweet. So, I turned myself to face me but I've never caught a glimpse of how the others must see the faker; I'm much too fast to take that test.   
  
_

_Ch-ch-changes…Turn and face the strange…Ch-ch-changes…Don't want to be a richer man. Ch-ch-changes…Turn and face the strange…Ch-ch-changes…Just gonna have to be a different man._

How, David? _Time may change me; But I can't trace time._

  
A rack of cloth fell. Clack. Cloth was heavy, it could hit the ground hard. Not like a gunshot in any way. Except he was standing in an opening between two buildings, looking at a group of ghosts beckoning him with four gunshots in his arm and through his neck, the universe flickering like someone kept flipping the light on and off.   
  
“You good, Shin?”  
  
Shin? Like the violet fade, the streets of the Terran village melted back into the work room of his mother who was casually picking up the fallen roll. Koji was leaning against the doorway, holding a textbook. Staring at his brother, Shin drawled, “…Yea. Um, I’ll be back in a bit, mama.”  
  
“Oh, go relax, Sweetie Plum! I know it’s boring in here.”  
  
“Not at all” he smiled…maybe, “It’s very calm here.”  
  
It’s his mind that wasn’t. A…a change, one he very well might not be able to trace back.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _Sometimes I feel like I don't have a partner; Sometimes I feel like my only friend is the city I live in, the city of angels. Lonely as I am, together we cry…_ _  
  
_“How is this less depressing than emo?”  
  
Shin opened his eyes, Yagami Jill painting brown across the whole of his hair as they sat in her room. Shaun had bleach processing in his bangs, looking at a manga and having posed this question, and Koji was sitting at Jill’s desk, doing homework. The brooding fellow drawled, “Because we weren’t fucking gleeful about it.”  
  
“Neither are we” Shaun pouted, looking up with narrow eyes.  
  
“You all literally made me listen to a song called ‘Cute Without the E’ which supposedly somehow leads to ‘Cut from the Team’ and I haven’t forgiven you yet” Koji snorted, “Cutting. What a thing to glorify.”  
  
Cutting? Jill snickered, “It isn’t _that_ bad a song, nii-san.”  
  
“I raised you better than that.”  
  
Shin laughed softly, looking up and around. Jill had some random posters of bands like ‘Yellowcard’ or something and ‘Simple Plan’ because, okay, but there were some surprising inclusions like ‘Korn’ and ‘System of a Down’. “I don’t know, Koji, definitely looks like you had some influence so I’d think you’d be a little proud.”  
  
“I’d be proud if my precious imoto listened to anything her heart desired” Koji assured, flipping the page in his book.  
  
Jill smirked widely, putting a weird plastic cap on Shin’s head, “Cute, nii-san, but you know you’re more okay that I listen to at least some of your music.”  
  
“No…” Koji drawled, rubbing his temple, “It’s annoying as all fuck, these emo bands, but I’d rather you all come up with your own tastes and whatnot. We didn’t have mom and dad policing our musical habits.”  
  
Very true… “C’mon, Shaun, let’s rinse out this bleach.”  
  
Shaun nodded, setting the manga down and going to her bathroom, the shower coming on. Yawning, Shin blinked languidly as the Red Hot Chili Peppers serenaded him with songs from 1992, when he was eleven and not a murderous monster that just hung around in his bedroom, listening to albums just like this…just…only with her.  
  
“…Koji.”  
  
“Hmm?”  
  
“…Did…Did…”  
  
…Ugh. Koji looked to him with a raised brow. Ugh. “S-So, Nesha…Nesha apparently sent a condolence letter, right?”  
  
“She did. It was very considerate. You must have left a lasting impression on her.”  
  
Somehow. He only spent three months with her, really. If…three months got him a condolence letter from an almost purely sexual partner though…   
  
Koji looked up, wide-eyed, before grimacing. What? “…Uh…how mentally stable are you to get some bad news that doesn’t really relate to us but might make you sad?”  
  
What? Shin’s face scrunched, “…That’s not an easy assessment to make, Koji. But I’m pretty unstable right now, what’s one more instability? Tell me.”  
  
His brother shook his head, murmuring, “Apparently Naomi’s brother, Mako, he got killed in an air raid in July.”  
  
Shin stared at Koji who just continued to write while he…  
  
Covering his mouth, breathing in hard, Shin felt his eyes burn. No, no, no. “…Did…Are they sure?”  
  
“Yea…unlike you, they…they had a body and everything. He is, for certain, deceased.”  
  
“Oh God” Shin rasped.  
  
Mako was _communications_. _Communications._ If _anyone_ should be dead right now, it was Komari and _him,_ not _Mako_. God, did Komari know? Now…now they’d…they’d never sit down and…and hash out all that nonsense. It was over. That…  
  
Honestly feeling like crying, Shin shook his head, “H-How is Naomi?”  
  
“Destroyed. She left Saitama and went back to Tadaoka and I haven’t really heard from her since” Koji replied, “I mean, I…had faith in you coming back but I can’t say I was a hundred percent in a place to comfort her either. I think she had a better circle back in her hometown.”  
  
He…he told her to have faith. It didn’t work.  
  
“She was destroyed too.”  
  
Still shaken, dismayed by this news that simply just wasn’t fair to any conditions he expected from life, Shin looked up. Koji was just…steady completing his goals, something Mako now would never see. “What?”  
  
“She saw that article in the paper at school and rushed back to her house. Apparently she saw the news program too and she broke down entirely.”  
  
While on the tip of his tongue to say ‘who?’, he…had a creeping realization. “…Did…did she come over?”  
  
“Mm. She stayed for a few days before she just left in a fog. I checked on her from afar, she just went back to school. From what I’ve heard, she refuses to return home now.”  
  
…Okay. “I…I guess that’s good so I don’t…don’t run into her and blow this” he said quietly.  
  
Before Koji could respond, Jill and Shaun returned, the latter’s hair damp with the lower section just bleach blond. Shin was still…in agony but he definitely found himself looking at this strange phenomenon. “…You’re not a cute blond either.”  
  
“I’d look crazy blond” Shaun said in agreement.  
  
“You two” Jill giggled, grabbing some container of what just looked like a jar of cobalt blue.  
  
Jill with gloved hands teased the stuff into Shaun’s hair as he continued his manga before also placing a plastic cap on his head. Coming to him, she helped him up…but oh no, wait. “U-Uh, let me rinse it out real fast, Jill.”  
  
“Eh? But nii-san--”  
  
“Jill.”  
  
The young woman looked back at Koji who didn’t say anymore, just shaking his head. Oh, were they aware of his craziness that might have him snap on her if she was mildly dipping his head under water? Apparently, as she simply nodded, handing him a bottle of shampoo and advising him how to wash it. Okay…  
  
It was a struggle, his legs did not care about glamour and he was already kind of pressing it with them lately. However, he managed to stand there and get it out, watching the water run dark before becoming red, the way the wounds he washed of his and Komari’s would, because, as he suspected, he was a psycho.  
  
Using a towel, he roughly scrubbed his head of the lingering wetness before catching the mirror out of the corner of his eye and pausing.  
  
…Aside from the fact that he never kept his hair quite this long, that definitely looked more like him with the consistent coloring. His skin had started to peel but with the aloe vera, he was looking less burnt and more tanned. His reflection wasn’t…completely foreign now.  
  
Why…why didn’t he feel any better then?  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _Shin was back in the base. It was rare, he held no…real contempt in those memories, no real suffering. He thought anyway.  
  
He was lying on the cot during that isolated period they tried in order to break him. He wrote, he read, he napped—it was boring but his psyche was unaffected. He had people to get back to. His loneliness wouldn’t last forever.  
  
Then Kitamura appeared, opening the door, sauntering in, charred and with a bullet hole in his head. Shin stared at him, his pulse in his throat as Kitamura just stared at him languidly.   
  
“…Yagami, why did you live? You. Why you?”  
  
Shin didn’t know what to say, only that he often heard the lyrics of Alive in his head. ‘Do I deserve to be?’. He sat up, staring at Kitamura some more. “…I was lucky, Kitamura.”  
  
“Lucky? Lucky!” Kitamura spat, his lips taut and wrinkled, “Lucky is finding a gold piece on the ground. You. Why you?”  
  
“…I can’t answer that. If…that’s the question, I can’t be the one to answer it.”  
  
“Despicable. Over a hundred people died and you…YOU, some ‘lucky’ bastard get to sit at home with your family in your comfy mansion while the rest of us were murdered, slaughtered—left for dead. 95%, Yagami! You had a better chance of being struck by lightning than getting out of that desert alive! Why not ME? Why not Fumo? Or Ueda?”  
  
“I don’t know, Kitamura” Shin hissed, shaking. “All I know is I’m doing better than you.”  
  
“Are you really?”  
  
“No.”  
  
No. There was no way he deserved to be sitting here more than anyone else in his unit—he most certainly didn’t deserve to be sitting here versus Mako. He couldn’t even ask. Maybe Joe or Aden or Sonja were dead now on some bullshit mission. Meanwhile, he managed to survive a desert for two months to sit here in his giant cozy bed with his body intact. He didn’t even get dismembered like Komari did, he didn’t get everlasting scars like that! He got out alive with some bullet holes. They could have shot him in the back of the head, his body could have shut down entirely due to lack of water, he could have died of exhaustion—_

 _But here he was, sleeping at home, comfortable. Comfortable.  
  
_ “Shin.”  
  
Shin’s eyes snapped open, picking up a cup off his nightstand and shattering it. Heaving, he held a piece of glass, ready to still fight for this life he was needlessly allowed to maintain, and glared around sharply. _  
  
_Koji. He was sitting up on the bed he’d set up in the corner, his dark eyes somehow aglow in the twilight, half closed and just disturbingly unbothered. Shin stared back before swallowing, setting the glass down. One terrible reason Koji was the right person for the job: he was shellshocked without reason and that ultimately made him entirely more unpredictable in his reactions.  
  
This time, his brother stood up, flipping on the lights…and handed him a blunt. Yep. Mr. Unpredictable. “Smoke that. You’re talking in your sleep. Whoever Kitamura is, he’s chased you the last two weeks. Put him to rest.”  
  
Two weeks. Shin miserably took the lighter from Koji, lighting up the joint and taking a puff as Koji absently picked up the glass. Put him to rest. It’d…it’d be nice. “…I’m not going to make it, Koji. It’s getting worse. I’m—I’m getting more flashbacks as time keeps going. I just…I just need to take those pills and keep myself numb. If…if it goes on like this, I’m going to hurt someone. I don’t want to hurt any of you.”  
  
Koji yawned, dropping the glass into a trashcan in the edge of the room before going back to settle in the bed. “You can talk to me, Shin.”  
  
“The fuck is talking going to do?” he hissed, holding the smoldering drug between his fingers, “Talking. I can tell you things but is that some magic spell to undo it? To undo what I’ve done and what’s come to pass for me? No. Talking is bullshit.”  
  
“It is. Unfortunately, it’s all we have as humans.”  
  
Shin grimaced at that. Yes…very unfortunate. “I appreciate your offer, Koji, but it won’t help—I didn’t deserve to live and there’s no answering why I did.”  
  
Resting on his side, propped up on his elbow, Koji gazed at him sleepily, “Is this some Pearl Jam quoting shit? Maybe you need to start listening to Coldplay.”  
  
“I’m serious, Koji.”  
  
“Me too” Koji murmured, his eyes closing, “You can ask that question all day…and Pearl Jam is right, who can answer that? No one. Why did dad make it out of Wasaba when others were killed? Why did mom gain success when so many others have failed following the exact same path? How were we able to get out of a fucking yakuza’s house? They all might have _reasons_ but there’s no answer.”  
  
… “…I wish that made it better, Koji. There are…reasons and answers for why I don’t deserve it” Shin whispered, the smoke billowing in the night like a spirit escaping him.   
  
“Nah, you have reasons why you’re struggling to live with that weight right now. You have thoughts on why you _shouldn’t_ be…but it’s the weed if you think you know.”  
  
Koji ended up dozing off, probably still in a half sleep because he had neither reasons nor answers in life. Koji just wasn’t comfortable to complain to for those reasons but…he wasn’t wrong.  
  
Setting the joint in the ashtray, feeling that daze starting to set in that would ease him into an easier slumber, Shin relaxed into his bed.   
  
….No, he wasn’t wrong. If Shin had answers, he might not like them and they may be hard to accept but he couldn’t argue if it was for a purpose. He had no answers for why he lived, mostly unscathed, when so many died in the same battle. After all he’d had to do, all he’d had to stake…he just…wanted someone to answer the question: why was he alive right now? This hollow of a man whose reflection looked like someone he once knew.  
  
Shin briefly opened his eyes to stare at the ceiling.   
  
Yagami Shin would have never strangled someone to death. Yagami Shin would have never cut someone’s throat. Yagami Shin would have been paralyzed after murdering the amount of people he did but he never even wavered. Yagami Shin would have never left those families, those babies, to boil in a black cage when he could have at least tried. Yagami Shin would have never just buried bodies like he was planting trees. Yagami Shin…would have been terrified by that person in the desert.  
  
That was it. Kitamura was wrong.

…He had died out there.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 **End Notes:**  
  
If you don’t know, hospice is basically care for when you have a disease that isn’t expected to allow you to live freely or long.   
  
‘STP’ stands for Stone Temple Pilots, another 90s grunge band with yet another dead lead singer…man, rough.  
  
So what’s actually really funny (to me) here is that, when I was writing the super early version of these characters, Koji, Nelly, and Shin were closer to my age so, thus, they listened to that early emo and were a part of that scene (Yellowcard, Dashboard Confessional—I remember even having scenes where Popuri and Koji would go on dates listening to The Taste of Ink by The Used). HOWEVER, when I rehashed the scene for the series I released online, Koji, Nelly, and Shin were made to be much older. Also, their personalities just…do not seem in keeping with the emo theme. I’m a grunge _and_ emo kid but the latter definitely makes me chuckle more than it should.  
  
They’re listening to Under the Bridge by the Red Hot Chili Peppers when Jill is coloring Shin’s hair. Cute Without the E which Koji mentions is by Taking Back Sunday.  
  
Alive is by Pearl Jam.  
  
  



	15. Humanity

**Chapter 15:** Humanity  
  
 **Author’s Note:** In my journey to build SpongeBob…I have found an absolute impossibility as a pseudo-crafter and painter:

I’m _out of white paint_. Who runs out of _white paint_? Violence and…blunt talking. Happy reading!  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Just…  
  
Koji said he didn’t want to give him the pot that helped him sleep too often, not wanting it to lose its edge, but that he’d give him something to make him ‘numb’. Shin didn’t care. Or whomever this was in this shell.

Lying flat on his back on the floor, smoking the blunt Koji rolled for him, he stared at the ceiling. There definitely was numbing…just that purple haze that taunted him with a fate he only spiritually met. It hadn’t granted him the full package.  
  
 _Nothing seems to kill me…no matter how hard I try; Nothing is closing my eyes. Nothing can beat me down for your pain or delight…no._

_And nothing seems to break me…no matter how far I fall; Nothing can break me at all. Not one for giving up though not invincible. I know…_

_I’ve given everything I need, I’d give you everything I own; I’d give in if it could at least be ours alone. I’ve given everything I could to blow it to hell and gone. Burrow down in and blow up the outside, blow up the outside world…_

Shin had stopped eating. He hadn’t needed food in the desert. A shell didn’t need sustenance…  
  
“Shin.”  
  
He glanced to the side where Koji was standing, dressed all in black with his arms crossed in the doorway. His face was expressionless. “…I was hoping the weed gave you the munchies. You need to eat something.”  
  
“No thanks.”

_Someone…tried to tell me something. “Don’t let the world bring you down”. Nothing can do me in before I do myself. So save it for your own and the ones you can help…no._

_I’ve given everything I need, I’d give you everything I own; I’d give in if it could at least be ours alone. I’ve given everything I could to blow it to hell and gone. Burrow down in and blow up the outside, blow up the outside, blow up the outside, blow up the outside world._

Koji cut his eyes toward his stereo, drawling, “…Keep this up. I’ll confiscate your albums and replace them with Kenny G.”  
  
“Just kill me then.”

 _Want to make it understood…wanting though I never would. Trying though I know it’s wrong. Blowing it to hell and gone. Wishing I never could…  
  
Blow up the outside, blow up the outside, blow up the outside, blow up the outside world…  
  
_Yagami Koji smirked. Smirked. “Not that it’ll cure _anything_ but you really need to get laid, man.”  
  
That crazy punk. “I beg your _pardon_?”  
  
“This shit is crazy, Shin. All you can do is sit around our, albeit large, home and be miserable. You’re just going to lie here on the ground and get high and wish you were dead while listening to bands from our childhood that have broken up. I’m ready to call your major or colonel and tell him for you ‘fuck it’.”  
  
… “No, Koji…” he mumbled.  
  
“Why?”  
  
Yea, why? It…didn’t matter. It wasn’t like…he’d done something honorable or…  
  
…Or… “…I did awful things, Koji. If…if they can at least…get one good outcome out of that, I…”  
  
This shell…might be able to live with that carnage and the pool of blood he was drowning in. The Yagami Shin that joined the army three years ago had been blown up but…

_Blow up the outside…blow up the outside…blow up the outside…blow up the outside…blow up the outside…blow up the outside…blow up the outside…blow up the outside…_

But what? This is what dead Shin would have wanted? Did it even matter now? How the fuck dare he be self-serving and hope that _one_ good deed would undo every sin he committed in that desert? And what did it matter what happened once they ‘rescued’ the Terrans if there was anything but dead bodies to retrieve? It erased nothing. It didn’t matter because, in the end, the part of him that did the right thing perished in that field. Still in the desert…

The outside world…didn’t matter anymore.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Friday evenings, Koji left to go back to his dorm in Saitama and took four classes. It wasn’t the overload he’d been doing but he assured it would only put him slightly off course. Shin somewhat wondered if the people around him found it suspicious but Koji shrugged. “…Guess I’ve been aloof enough they don’t know how I’m dealing. No one’s asked any questions.”  
  
In his stead, on Saturdays, was Yagami Nerimaru. By and large, it used to be that Shin got along best with Nelly. When they were children, Nelly was the fun one and exciting. Koji was withdrawn because he had been abused by monsters. This Shin or that Shin, he would never have the repulsive sin of degrading a child—a baby, really—but the murder? The killing? The lack of respect for human life? Whoever he was now, this husk, he was a monster too. Koji, robbed of all traces of that experience, still fought perverts that thought to salivate over their sister when she was barely to their knee to a bloody halt. Koji didn’t remember seeing the abuse of their mother but he’d protect her name alone with violence. Koji knew monsters.  
  
Nelly, on the other hand, was not as privy of that knowledge.  
  
Sitting up in bed, having needed another Xanax today after taking them for four days straight to dull himself, he stared as the ‘hero’ floated around in a carefree fantasy, dodging bullets and even ceasing their race with his hands. Their bullets were so quiet. So many bullets but so quiet. So easy to just fly away at their convenience to escape the hoards.   
  
“Nerimaru, turn that off.”  
  
Surprises were the worst thing imaginable. He didn’t care to react when he was on these pills but that fucking innate bastard—that core feeling of survival still tried to kick in, flailing at the fog to make him respond to a potential mercy. Without the drugs, he might have picked up something and tried to bludgeon a family member. His father today, actually, his papa that raised him in all the hardships just for him to become a braindead zombie.   
  
Yagami Yamada looked a bit cross as he entered the room. Nelly glanced up and frowned, turning the movie off without question. It was a relief. Nelly didn’t understand monsters.  
  
“…Sorry, Shin. That was probably really shitty.”  
  
“It’s just a fantasy.” They died so easily. Just unplugged. They could just…stop or dodge bullets. If only it were that simple.  
  
His dad tipped his head, “Your mom got some groceries, Nelly. Can you help her real fast?”  
  
“Oh, yea…”  
  
As Nelly left, Yamada sat on the bed, staring at him. Four weeks, he’d been home. A month now. Long enough for the man that raised Yagami Shin to know that his son really hadn’t come back. Yamada slowly shook his head, “…Son, talk to me. How can I help you?”  
  
“You can’t.”  
  
“There has to be a way” Yamada insisted, sitting up straighter to try to look in his eyes. He wished he could focus on something. “Son, you are mind broken right now and I want to understand.”  
  
He smiled. Understand. “…You saw 69 people die, one of them being your best friend, and have to live with what happened to your son. For all that to happen and you to have to sit here and ask for clarity, then, you’ll never understand. You’re simply stronger than I am.”  
  
“Shin, that doesn’t begin to be true” Yamada gawked.  
  
He looked away to the ornate waves and pursed his lips. He tried to go into it finally a few days ago. It didn’t lead anywhere but outside to the vines, he found from the window. He should have expected that.  
  
His father sat in his view, his face firm. Oh. “Shin, after everything we’ve been through, I refuse to lose you to this. Help me understand. Tell me.”  
  
“It’s just really too late for that.”  
  
“Shin.”  
  
His beeper chimed, a signal that someone somewhere needed his help, his expertise. Shin tipped his head as Yamada’s face scrunched. “…Go. You can save that person.”  
  
“Shin, I’m not going anywhere. This—This is important too.”  
  
“Remember how I was a sharpshooter? Expert? I used that…to shoot people right through the forehead” Shin languidly gestured, folding his fingers so only the pointer and thumb were up, flexing his thumb down, “It’s not always deadly, I’m sure you know, but when I did it? It was always deadly. Bam. Just brain matter and blood everywhere. At some points I thought, ‘damn, wonder if dad could fix that?’. Others I thought, my dad spent his life learning to fix the same thing I destroy. He’s the one that saves people. I get to annihilate.”  
  
“…I…”  
  
No one would know what to say to that. If what he once was were still alive, he’d have no response either. He would have just been sitting in the same room with a monster. His dad grimaced as his beeper buzzed again. Enough. “Take it, dad. You can lock the door behind you too to keep me in here and protect the family. Tell Nelly I’ll be fine behind a wall.”  
  
“…You will not be caged, Shin. We will get through this.”  
  
‘We’. Okay. His dad kissed his forehead and stood to leave. Shin gazed ahead but felt out of the corner of his eye his father falter by the door. He had considered it, locking him away. He decided against it though because he didn’t comprehend.  
  
Yagami Yamada knew monsters just like Yagami Koji did. He’d dealt with them since he was born, those that told him he was worthless and beat him for his parentage alone. He had friends and family that were monsters, the type that would turn on him for no reason. A monster stole his wife and ravaged his son’s innocence. No, Yagami Yamada also knew monsters and he just slew them from his path._

_He just wasn’t going to comprehend what to do when it was his own son.  
  
_ XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
“Speak quietly. I don’t know what to do.”  
  
Matsushima Shiro was on the roof of the hospital, smoking a cigarette. The man had cut back supremely since Yamada started to work for him in the eighties but he still indulged from time to time. Cutting his eyes toward Yamada as he approached him, Matsushima drawled, “About…?”  
  
“My son. My _baby_. Matsushima, he’s _falling apart._ A part of me is _falling apart_ and there is almost nothing I can do” Yamada hissed, shivering, “At one point, tha-that boy was _all I had_ that kept me going and now? Now, when he’s given up, I can give him _nothing_? I-I can’t fail _another_ child, Matsushima—Koji eats me up inside every single _day_. I can’t let that happen to _another_ , Matsushima, and God, _God_ , not my Shin.”  
  
The man grimaced, slowly holding the cigarette out to him. Against his better judgment, he took it and took a hard puff…and it felt like he’d sucked and filtered inflamed pepper right to his lungs. “Holy Christ” he rasped, his eyes wide.  
  
“Too strong for you now, kid?”  
  
At some point, he literally smoked eight of those a day because he enjoyed them. _Enjoyed_. And he got stress relief from setting his insides on fire. “I must have been crazy” Yamada wheezed, quickly handing it back.

Matsushima chuckled, inhaling lightly, “I guess I got to only experience that rough and tumble teenage version once and even then you were just being a damn overachiever. Bryant used to tell me about your antics and the suggestion you were some renegade rebel getting into street fights. I don’t see it. You’re just a know-it-all pain in the ass now.”  
  
“I resent that.”  
  
Turning to relax against the railing, Matsushima crossed one of his arms over his torso, gazing into the summer night over the city scape. There were some light honks in the background and the bustle of people. Yamada rested his palms on the barrier, looking out. It…it was always relaxing up here somehow. Clarifying. He needed clarity. He…he wanted to save his son. He had gotten this opportunity, one he was unable to accomplish with his best friend.  
  
“What was it that changed you from that version of yourself, Yagami? Aging, sure” Matsushima said, tapping his ashes, “But aging isn’t the only thing. What really made the Yagami here today?”  
  
“…Experience” Yamada whispered.  
  
And what Shin had experienced…was changing him too. Could he…stop that? Matsushima nodded, “What from your early life, your experiences, made you that previous version?”  
  
“…Living in Wasaba with my mom, I guess” Yamada muttered.  
  
“And when your only experience was that, what was it that made you change?”  
  
“ _My son_.”  
  
Matsushima gave him a look. “Because he’s the one on your mind right now, fool. What was it that got you solely out of Wasaba to be a renowned doctor? What was it that put that previous version in the back seat to make this man standing before me come out and go into overdrive?”  
  
 _Still_ his son! “Really?” Matsushima droned, “Your son was just delivered from the heavens to give you purpose? Or did someone _perhaps_ have a hand in his birth?”  
  
Running his hands down his face, Yamada droned, “ _God_ , Matsushima, you’re asking for a _reason_ and she’s…she’s so above that, I can’t fathom what to even call her sometimes. My mother bore me but Dana…Dana gave me life. I’d fight Hell itself for Dana.”

“Sappy. But you know why you’re here. Your son’s experiences have brought him to a place where he probably doesn’t know why he’s here. Yagami, out of a hundred people, your son was one of five. You just don’t do that, Yagami. It’s similar to being in a situation where you should be the seventieth person dead.”  
  
Yamada’s eyes widened, turning his head to stare hard at Matsushima. The older man’s gaze was sharp. “I will never say something as frappy or ridiculous as ‘love will save you always’, Yagami. It’s simply not the fact and we do a lot of tomfoolery in the name of love. Or we pin a lot of weight on a person to be our reason for surviving. However, when you’re at the end of your rope, sometimes life hands you the grip you need to keep going, whether it be yourself, your goals, your mother, or the love of your life. Something, and I mean _something_ , kept him going for sixty plus days the same way someone made you turn your back on the catalyst of sixty plus people dying. Whatever that was, whatever that is, to be able to live with what he has featured, he’s going to need to hold on to it.”  
  
Oh. Staring into the night sky, he winced. Yes. “…Motivation.”  
  
“He might buckle a bit—he might even have a breakdown. But motivation can be stronger than any damn experience put before us” Matsushima murmured, “Help him. Talk to him. Find out what brought him out of that desert if it wasn’t for him. He’ll find his way out of it, Yamada.”  
  
“…If he doesn’t?”  
  
“He’ll stay lost in the desert, Yagami. Maybe forever.”  
  
…Damn it.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

His legs were healing.  
  
Going down the steps, dazed, he felt irritated. He was thirsty. In the desert, there were times when, when he could finally drink water, it was like he had forgotten the very function of drinking. He trained his body to withstand going without a requirement of life. Now, here? Back at home in this marshmallow bed with air conditioning and cooling, watching television and forced into eating three square meals a day _with_ snacks? He got thirsty regularly. And his needs could be met.   
  
“Isn’t there some way we can… _help him_? He’s a _zombie_!”  
  
Shin paused his descent, out of view of the kitchen where Tony’s voice echoed. There was only one zombie in this house.   
  
“I really do hate seeing him like this. It’s…it’s like Shin never even came back.”  
  
You weren’t wrong, Nelly. He hadn’t. “That’s not fair to say though. They sent him back without helping him. It’s like going to the hospital with a broken leg and they give you a bandage. He needed more than a bandage and they shouldn’t have sent him somewhere where he can just get more damage.”  
  
Shaun was a deep kid but wrong in this instance. There…was no help for this version. “Shaun’s right. Maybe…maybe we can call and tell them that in code or something. We’re pretty smart, we can cook up a code.”  
  
Oh no, he’d have to stop this then. Coming forward a little to insist to Jill that couldn’t occur, he stopped again when the confusing voice of Koji chimed in. Why were they all there? He was usually at school.  
  
“Look, you guys, I know you asked Nell and I to be here out of concern. And I definitely want to assure you it’ll be normal again one day, that the big brother we had just needs a little therapy and some psychology to get him back. But I have to tell you, I don’t think that’s going to happen.”  
  
…Oh.  
  
“Wow, Mr. Optimistic” Nelly scoffed sarcastically, “Funny you stay so positive in insane situations but go negative when someone needs it.”  
  
“It’s not being negative or positive, Nelly. Facts are just facts. When you go through things in your life, they change you, they alter you. They fit into your growth or regression as a person. Shin won’t tell me or anyone else what it is he went through out there but I think we’re all old enough to realize you don’t roam around enemy territory for two months and live to talk about it without doing something you’re not proud of. Shin is either coming to terms with that or he’s not.”  
  
…   
  
“The first Rambo” Shaun suddenly gasped.  
  
“Not that I want to give any credit to a movie but…yea.”  
  
“…Then what you’re saying is there _is_ no way to help him?” Tony whispered, “This…this is just _development_?”  
  
“I don’t…I don’t think Shin wants this kind of development” Jill murmured.  
  
“I’ll never say we throw him to the wolves or anything like that. Just don’t think our nii-san is just around the corner somewhere needing a hospital visit and a few talks with a shrink. Once he’s ‘off duty’, he might find himself being able to return to some stuff he likes or even having the same habits. But…our minds just don’t fix themselves. That’s why it’s hard to quit drugs or quit bad habits, we’ve adapted to them and part of that state is still there even if you do. But…you don’t recover from experience. At least, you don’t just forget it.”  
  
…Shit.  
  
“…I was such an ass to him before he left” Tony rasped, “He…he was only trying to help me and I…I—I wanted to do the same but hearing this…? I can’t…I can’t even help him a little bit? Because… _life?_ ”  
  
“It makes sense” Shaun said simply, “…Just sense kind of sucks.”  
  
“It sucks a lot” Nelly muttered, “…He’s still a _zombie_ though, Koji. That just…just can’t be the way anyone can live.”  
  
Koji probably shrugged. Shin couldn’t see him but he knew his brother had. He wasn’t going to tell them he was taking hard medication that had him zonked into another dimension. It didn’t matter. He shuffled back up the steps, no longer thirsty, and sat back on his bed, gazing into space.  
  
…So Shin wasn’t dead, huh? This…this was just what experience had made him? He hadn’t been replaced at all.

Right. He had just become a monster.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _“So you heard us.”  
  
Shin was lying in bed, watching Rambo. It was pretty close, actually, to what he was feeling. He gave this movie kudos. Better than that fucking flying around and dodging bullet shit because reality was supposed to be this terrible but malleable thing. They got one part right.  
  
Cutting his eyes to Koji who came in with his bookbag, looking dreary, Shin drawled, “Heard what?”  
  
“The kids worrying about you and ready to send you to be institutionalized” Koji said dryly, setting his bag by his makeshift bed and falling into it.  
  
“Maybe I just want to watch Rambo” Shin countered, a bit of sarcasm escaping in his tone.  
  
Koji droned into his pillow, “I’ve been able to discern footsteps since I was a kid, punk, I don’t let a lot sneak past me.”  
  
Shit. Rubbing his temple, aware of where that tendency came from while Koji didn’t, he didn’t say anything about it. Couldn’t. Koji knew footsteps because he wanted to hear that bastard coming in the night. During this spell of staying in the same room together for an extended amount of time, something they’d never done, Shin learned that sometimes Koji talked in his sleep too. It was indiscernible to a degree but he got enough bits and pieces to know. Koji…Koji never subconsciously forgot anything. That’s why…that’s why he could never…tell Koji what he was both consciously and subconsciously going through because at least…at least he had the former.   
  
_But the latter…the latter was the danger.  
  
“Yagami!! Infiltrate! Infiltrate!”  
  
Shin rushed in after a now dead fellow soldier rammed open a door in Sharance. Shooting. So much shooting. Holding his assault rifle, shooting into other human beings without abandon, he trembled. He just wanted to sleep. He just wanted to sleep. Why was he a soldier even in his dreams?  
  
It was a bewildering sensation but a Zech’s soldier grabbed his arm forcefully but it felt like a feather graze on his shoulder. Hissing, he elbowed the man away and wrestled him to the ground, wrapping his hands around their throat. They thrashed, punching hard at his bad shoulder but he didn’t let go.  
  
Another soldier shoved him away _hard_. It felt like he’d been knocked back by a stonewall. They were screaming at him to ‘die, fucker’. No, he…he wanted to, he thought, but…he always dreamed he was fighting? Why…was he fighting though?

 _“Shin!”_  
  
Shin swung hard, connecting his fist to the bastard’s jaw. He heard a grunt and went in for another across the other cheek. Fist fights on the field were rare. Very rare. That wasn’t to say they didn’t occur, it just wasn’t a sufficient way to fight. When he thought about it though, they captured every Zech’s soldier they ever got into a fist fight with. They…they must not have wanted to die. Maybe…he needed to get his gun out…  
  
 _“Shin, snap the fuck out of it!”  
  
_ Why’d this fucker know his name? Jabbing into his gut before straight arming into his chest, Shin gritted his teeth. These bastards…even had him fighting in his dreams.  
  
 _“…Okay, FUCK IT_.”  
  
What was this bastard even talking about? Before Shin could snap at him to not get any smart ideas, that he could kill him, something…happened.  
  
Like the sensation of the touch on his shoulder didn’t match the death grip he was seeing, what he felt across his jaw…felt like someone threw a fucking _car_ at his face. He was pretty sure he felt his lower mouth going a separate direction from the top. The fuck?!  
  
No, when Shin took a punch with the same exact intensity to his stomach, he realized something was very wrong, especially since the guy in this dream wasn’t punching him at all.   
  
Sure enough, opening his eyes, he found himself somehow in a fist fight with his little brother, the one and only Yagami Koji, in his bedroom.  
  
Shin wanted to say he…didn’t have a lot of petty moments in his life, at least when it came to his siblings. But his mind was already sawdust and he snapped. How the fuck dare this prick hit him like that?!  
  
Grabbing Koji by the neck of his shirt, he pulled his fist back and punched him right in the jaw. Ready to guillotine him into the wall, he could only watch, wide-eyed, as Koji reached out, grabbed his head, pulled his neck back as far as it would go and _headbutted him against his skull._

He fell back, shocked and dazed, hearing…screaming. It wasn’t first on his mind though, he literally just got headbutted. Enraged, he tackled Koji _hard_ and they ended up rolling into the hallway. Koji threw _another_ megaton punch at his other cheek and Shin was almost seeing red… _and stars_ because _damn_ , it hurt.  
  
Grappling and rolling so he was on top, he pummeled Koji hard in just one side of his face. For a second, it looked like Koji was just going to take it. “STOP IT, BOTH OF YOU!!”  
  
What? Wait…was that mama? Before he could register why his mom was here screaming at them, all of a sudden, Koji managed to…lift him. Shin kicked, screaming, “Put me the fuck down!!”  
  
Punching Koji in the top of the head, he was getting…alarmed because they were about to reach the opening where they could look down to the foyer. No big deal, just…about thirty feet to the ground. Oh, _fuck no_. Thrashing, he managed to grab a hold of the railing and put Koji in a neck lock. In this position, Koji would go _with him_ if he tried to throw him…and that fucker still went full through the motions without a hint of hesitation.  
  
Shin yelped, pinning his legs to save _both of them_. That…that’s right. _That’s_ why fighting Koji scared him more than the Zechs. When the Zechs were shooting at him, they were trying to save their lives, it was a 50/50 chance. When they got into a fist fight, they really didn’t want to die. There was a survival instinct at play.  
  
Koji was always ready to fight to the death and he’d go down with you without a care about his own life.  
  
…He…was still fighting for his life too, for some reason.  
  
The move ended up somehow knocking them down the first flight of steps to the landing, wrenched against every squared, wooden edge, before hitting the wall below them hard. Both lying there, panting, Shin cut his swollen eye toward Koji who was holding his own face. “…You…crazy… ass… bastard.”  
  
“Ow.”  
  
If this wasn’t bad enough, he actually squeaked when his mother was suddenly looming over them, holding a broom. Okay, fine, they didn’t get into _a lot_ of fights but they could get pretty rough and tumble as kids and their mother hated it. Starting to hold up his hands to indicate at least _he_ was done with that after almost being thrown off, Shin paused.  
  
There were…red and blue bruise marks around his mother’s throat. What? Who…  
  
Everything fell quiet as he realized he hadn’t been choking a Zech’s soldier at all.  
  
“No” he sobbed, rapidly shaking his head, “No, no, no, no, _no_.”  
  
Tripping over himself, he clambered to his feet and quickly rushed out, his mind a blur of screaming and lack of focus as he made his way out the back door and over the deck. _No_. This. This was…was exactly what he never wanted to see happen. He told her not to touch him. He told her! God, _why_?! Was this the son that she risked her life for crawling out of a house in the mud that would _choke her_?  
  
Shin cried, weeping, as he settled in the forest, the ‘jungle’, clenching his face as he curled up into a ball and rocked. He should have died. That’s all he had deserved, he should have died. No one else came out of the desert, survived to see their family again, and was so fucking crazy they almost choked out their own _mother_. God, _why didn’t he just die_? He didn’t _deserve this_. He killed _so many,_ he should have _never_ made it out, _why_?  
  
“…Shin.”  
  
With a shiver, he looked up to the opening from their yard. Koji.  
  
His brother, someone else he had no business fighting like a Zech’s soldier. His shirt was torn from where Shin grabbed him and his face was swelling and blue. “…You fight like an absolute bastard. Kudos.”  
  
Shin glared at him, shaking, “L-Leave me alone, Koji. I-I don’t want to fight you anymore.”  
  
“I’m always ready for a fight, Shin, but I didn’t follow you out here because I’m ready to continue it” Koji assured, getting a bit closer. “…Mom wants you to come back inside.”  
  
God, no… “I’ll just live out here” he whispered, “I-I don’t understand what happened, how…how did I…”  
  
Koji sat down beside him some paces, groaning in agony as he sat with his leg outstretched, “Sorry, man, I was just coming out of the shower and I guess mama must have heard you mumbling and moaning in your sleep and tried to wake you. I came out, you…you know.”  
  
Biting his lip, starting to cry again, he rasped, “I don’t want to hurt any of you, Koji. Please, j-just leave me out here. Tell mama I don’t deserve her.”  
  
With a shake of his head, Koji murmured, “…Pretend it works for a second, onii-san. Just pretend. We just got into a whole fist fight because you were hallucinating we were Zechian soldiers. So just pretend…that talking helps and tell me something.”  
  
Shin gazed up at the moon. Huh…this was the first time he’d been outside since he came home. Staring at the stars, the mid-September air cool and misty, he swallowed. He didn’t…want to tell Koji. But…for all he couldn’t offer Koji in regard to the subconscious, he just consciously fought him in a lapse of sanity. He…he guessed he owed him.  
  
“…It was rough the first time, Koji. I…I saw all that torture and…insanity in Sharance. I killed like…sixteen people. It messed with me but I…I could sort of live with it because those…those people were threatening the people I swore to protect in that moment. I…I was defending people.”  
  
Koji reached into his pocket, retrieving a cigarette and lighting it up, nodding. Shin rested his chin on his knees, trembling, “…I got shot this time, of course, and I…I was still _okay_. I was shaken and jumpy and scared it would happen again but I…I wasn’t messed up. Then…then we…we got shot out of the sky. We survived…a _plane crash_ essentially, Koji, and a terrorist attack. We got off to fight…fight hundreds of soldiers to the death and then we were…were stranded.”  
  
“…They kept coming. We’d go a few days, no problem, hoping they’d find us” Shin whispered, “Then…more of them would come and then more of us would die. I…I knew we had to get word that we were still alive. I…I didn’t want to die, Koji. I hadn’t wanted to die.”  
  
“Mm.”  
  
“Out there, that’s…that’s when it became more than…than just killing to protect. I was…I was killing to stay _alive_. It no longer was about protecting the Terrans out there, it was about protecting myself. And that’s when-when just all…all humanity left me, Koji. I _strangled someone_ , Koji. Strangled someone until they _stopped breathing_. Just…the life snuffed out with my bare fucking hands” Shin whimpered, holding his hands palm up.  
  
“When…when it was me and Komari in the desert, we…we came across a camp, found where they were holding Terran’s hostage in a hot torture building and-and we couldn’t do anything _for them,_ Koji, we were barely keeping ourselves alive. And to-to add insult to injury, do you know what I did outside of that place, Koji? We came across some watchers that were supposed to warn their men of intruders. Komari and I got the jump on them and _cut their throat_. I _cut someone’s throat_. As deep as I dug, I felt all of it…and that was just to keep _me_ alive because we couldn’t even help those people. Every single one of them may be dead now.”  
  
Shaking his head, Koji inhaled hard, “…Shit.”  
  
“Every. Single. Body I dropped…I killed close to ninety people, Koji. Shot them through the head. Got their…brain matter sprayed across my uniform. And I buried…every single one of them. I just—I just threw them in a hole out there, never to be found, in the desert. Then I—I let my best friend out there get _shot_ , get _injured_ , because that shit was getting to me and she lost her _leg_ because of me. Then…then, for us to get so-so randomly rescued, I just…I just knew…”  
  
Covering his head, rocking, Shin sobbed, “There were _a hundred_ soldiers, Koji. By the end of it, it was just Komari, Kasumi, Soga, Koike, and _me_ left. _Five people,_ Koji. After all the killing and violence, after I made people suffer, _five people made it_. Me. _Me_. I _made it_ and I didn’t deserve to _live_ , Koji. Not after all the horror I inflicted. I’m a _monster_.”  
  
Koji didn’t say anything. He was going to say something encouraging like, ‘well, they were monsters too!’ like it even mattered. He went there to be the right person, the good person. To _protect._ In that damned desert, his life was fifty percent of the reason he committed homicide and there was no way around that. He survived…when Mako didn’t, when Kitamura didn’t. It just…it just was no encouraging this.  
  
“…Well, nii-san, that is kind of monstrous.”  
  
Oh. Shin nodded glumly. “Except, y’know…on occasion, dad mentions a doctor that did the bare minimum, didn’t act within full capacity, and gave not zero shits when something happened to their patient. In comparison, our dad treats life as the holy grail. He means to save all he can and will do everything in his power to.”  
  
“And he has a son that did everything in his power to take human life” Shin hissed, his eyes hot.  
  
“He has a son that actually considers that.”  
  
…What? Koji flicked his finger, tapping off ashes, “In history, millions of soldiers have gone out with a mission, a goal. We both know they weren’t always honorable missions or goals, but they believed in them. In history, many of those soldiers removed the life out of someone…and it never once made them question their goals. That, in my opinion, is truly monstrous.”  
  
Shin’s eyes widened, glancing to him. Koji gestured, his eyes creasing, “We weren’t _designed_ to _have_ to remove someone else’s life, Shin. Our minds should never get comfortable with that, it’s not our right as a species. But you have people that do that willfully and righteously; they feel like they’re entitled because they have a mission, a goal. They never even look at the life it took to accomplish that and that’s scary. What’s also scary is, that means, you…you were the right person for this job, Shin: you never took it as your right to end these people’s lives and take pride in what you were doing. You mourn the fact that you had to lose your humanity by doing what we weren’t designed to do to accomplish this.”  
  
No, no, that… “I did bad things, Koji…awful, awful things…why me? Why _me_?”  
  
“Your humanity.”  
  
That didn’t make _sense_! Koji sighed softly, “…Your humanity, Shin. While we aren’t designed to kill, we are designed to want to survive. We might say some self-derogatory things every now and then but we have an instinct inside of us that wants to live. When we don’t, something is injured. Something inside Kurt Cobain was hurting and injured. You weren’t ever _broken_ , Shin. You didn’t get thousands of miles across the desert in deadly conditions with no instinct to live. And it’s perfectly okay if that’s hurting and injured inside you now.”  
  
… “That’s the worst part” he whispered, “I’m jumpy…attacking our _mama_ …because that part of me is as strong as ever. I…I don’t know if I can come to terms with my meaning of survival or the fact that that…can’t seem to ever shut off.”  
  
“I don’t have all the answers for that type of thing, Shin. I know you’re sad because you had to maliciously wound people. You aren’t looking at whether they deserved it or not, you’re looking at the toll you had to take to defend your life and Komari’s. You…you never completely lost your empathy or compassion, the ideal that there has to have been a better way. You even mourn that prick Kitamura, the one you told us treated you like shit, because you didn’t want him to have to go out like that. You’re not a monster, Shin…just a human being tasked with doing monstrous things that you regret.”  
  
Shin quietly cried as Koji rubbed his shoulder absently, “You know, I saw a counselor at the university. It was free so I thought, what the hell?”  
  
…What? “You…you did?”  
  
“Mm.”  
  
“…Why?”  
  
“Because I don’t have a living instinct and do have an off the chain temper” Koji smiled, “I know what I see…and I know that’s not the person I want to be.”  
  
…Oh. “T-That’s good, Koji. I’m…I’m proud of you and happy.”  
  
“No guarantee it’ll work. But I feel a little bit better about having tried. I’m still in a place with a trigger temper but I want to do better.”  
  
Shin nodded, wiping his eyes, as Koji murmured, “…It’s different, Shin, but…I think we’re both stuck in a desert in a way. Just I think eventually we have to open our eyes to what’s actually going on around us.”  
  
…Glancing up at the stars, Shin took a deep breath. Even when they were wandering outside, he’d stopped looking at the sky. He was so mentally and physically exhausted, the function of it just didn’t matter. Temperature. Day was absurdly hot, night was mildly cold. Now looking at it again, he felt…clarity.  
  
He couldn’t go back on what he’d done. He couldn’t accept what he had done. He…he wasn’t supposed to though, it wasn’t _acceptable_. He…he knew that. He went in thinking that being the ‘right one for the job’ was simply saving people. No, he…he needed to figure out how to end this function entirely. The goal…was to stop being a soldier.  
  
Until that day though? He still…wasn’t sure who this person was inside of him, just that they were, indeed, still in the desert.   
  
Just…maybe not lost. On a mission.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
End note:   
  
So we were getting ready to go to the Bahamas in 2017. Yes, I’ll wear a bikini _regardless_ but I was getting my blood sugars really regulated with a new diet (I’m a diabetic) and was rebuilding my legs (delayed PCL surgery in 2011 makes my legs a little touch and go) at the gym. While I was waiting for my friend to get out of the locker room, on the television, it announced that Chris Cornell has committed suicide. I was…shocked. Not that I’m some huge huge Soundgarden/Audioslave fan but I _liked_ them.   
  
After I got back from my cruise, I happened to be listening to the ‘Blow Up the Outside World’ at work and, despite it being a song I’ve listened to on and off for years, that line “Nothing will do me in until I do myself” just really, really, _really_ jumped out along with other lyrics. Then like four months later, Chester Bennington killed himself…   
  
So, if you need help in any capacity, don’t think it’s beyond you. There are resources and we are leagues more connected to information that we’ve ever been along with means. You don’t have to leave your house to seek counsel and even in the capitalistic healthcare of the U.S., there are ways. Pay attention to your mental health, especially right now with this pandemic and other civil unrest. It’s just a…trying part of humanity.  
  
Blow Up the Outside World is by Soundgarden.  
  
Koji mentions that he’ll make Shin listen to ‘Kenny G’ who is a oft lauded jazz musician.   
  
When Shin is referring to them just ‘floating around’ and stopping bullets, he’s referring to The Matrix, the movie.   
  
Rambo stars Sylvester Stallone, a Vietnam vet that returned to America and was just essentially trying to reintegrate but was met by the disdain and distrust of the community. At one segment, he details his experiences being in the war.   
  
So dark few chapters and there’s still some storms to come BUT, if you’re new here, the Dark Ryuu motto is, even if it’s cloudy, there’s some rays of hope somewhere.   
  
  



	16. A Rush of Blood

**Chapter 16:** A Rush of Blood

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 _Conundrum.  
  
Jill called him in a panic, saying she overheard screaming upstairs. He was off the clock so he casually, projecting sadness, told his nurses he was going to check on his wife. Somehow, Yagami Yamada managed to walk out of the building, sadly getting in his car…and BOOKING IT up the road.  
  
When he rushed into the mansion, he found Dana by the deck door, wringing her hands. Approaching her, he asked what was going on. And she turned to him.  
  
On Dana’s seventeenth birthday, she asked her ex-husband if she could spend a few days with him. It was as crazy a situation as it sounded but that had been their life at some point. Dana wore long sleeved clothes despite it being the hottest end of summer and turned the lights off anytime they made love so he wouldn’t see. Eventually, he saw that she was covered in bruises, battery and abuse from that son of a bitch. He…had been angry millions of time in his life up to that point but he’d never been able to taste the rage in his pores.  
  
So today, 21 years later, with her standing here with bruise marks on her neck, he was…in a very mixed place. “…Dana, what…what the f…what the…?”  
  
He was quivering as she shook her head, grasping his hand, “H-He was thrashing so I-I know he said not to approach him but I-I just wanted to wake him up. I touched his shoulder as gently as possible—it’s my fault, I should have listened to him.”  
  
Squeezing the bridge of his nose, he took a long moment to compose himself. He…loved his son, his firstborn…but putting his hands around Dana’s throat was…  
  
“…I know he’s not in his right mind, I know it” he mumbled, “…But I want to beat him right now, not going to lie.”  
  
Dana rapidly shook her head, looking at him beseechingly, “Please, he-he and Koji got into it and they’re both just…VIOLENT. I think he took enough of a beating tonight, please.”  
  
Yamada sulked before kissing her forehead, “You’ll never have to plead with me not to hurt our kids, Dana, you know that.”  
  
“I know…” she rasped.  
  
“Where is he?”  
  
“He…he ran out into that wooded area in the back and Koji went after him.”  
  
God, please don’t have those two out there tussling in the woods, Yamada groaned, staring out. Koji…had protected his mother for a very long time. So, for this to happen…  
  
However, after a few more minutes, two shadowy figures emerged, moving hastily toward the deck to reenter the house. Yamada stepped back as Shin and Koji entered. Somehow, he was a bit incredulous, both of their faces were puffy, swollen, blue, and red. “…What in the WORLD?”  
  
“Papa…” Shin whispered.  
  
“Look at you two” Dana huffed, stalking toward the kitchen, “Sit down. I’m getting ice packs.”  
  
They both quietly sat on the couch as Yamada watched them. None of the wounds appeared…entirely fresh. Still though. Dana rushed in with ice packs, commanding them both to hold it to their faces. Koji pressed his against his cheek, his eyes closed, while Shin looked completely down at the floor. His wife looked frustrated. “I don’t want to see either of you fighting like that EVER again.”  
  
Yamada scowled as they both just mumbled, very noncommitted. Dana was cross, “I mean it, you two!”  
  
“I deserved far more, mama.”  
  
Shin was shaking. He was probably hallucinating when he did this but… Dana’s face softened and she knelt before him, clasping his cheeks, “I know it wasn’t intentional, Shin. You had already warned me, I just hadn’t taken heed.”  
  
“Stop. Stop, i-it’s not your fault” he sobbed, tears rolling down his face, “I-I’m so sorry, mama, I’m so sorry…”  
  
“My poor Sweetie Plum” she murmured as he wept, kissing his forehead.  
  
…Yamada knew about dreams too. “Dana, Koji, may I speak with Shin for a moment?”  
  
His wife gave him a brief look before nodding softly, standing and squeezing Shin’s hands, “Stop beating yourself up. I know your heart.”  
  
“…Maybe” he whispered.  
  
“I do. I know all of your hearts…and you’re knuckleheads” she said dryly, “C’mon, Koji.”  
  
Koji simply nodded, standing and patting Shin’s shoulder as he passed. No, the family…very much understood trauma, unfortunately. Shin probably just wasn’t used to being the one traumatized. Sitting beside his first born, Yamada was silent for a moment as Shin sniffed, wiping his eyes every few minutes.   
  
“…Son, what was it that got you out of the desert?”  
  
“…Mercy. Miracles.”  
  
Yamada shook his head. “…I was speaking with Matsushima. If it wasn’t for yourself, there…there was some motivation that kept you going until you were found, Shin. That you WERE found was a mercy, a miracle, but…it took you to get there. What was it that kept you from giving up?”  
  
Folding his hands together, Shin gazed off silently. He didn’t seem to be reflecting, just…blank. Maybe…maybe it wasn’t as straightforward as Matsushima made it sound.  
  
“…I had to keep rebuilding reasons.”  
  
Eh? Yamada tilted his head as Shin finally spoke, his voice faint. “At first, I…I wanted to make sure I got back because I didn’t want to worry you, make you think you’d…you’d have to bury another Shin. I wanted to get back to you all. And I wanted to make sure that the other soldiers got back to their families too.”  
  
“…Ah” Yamada whispered.  
  
Shin smiled bitterly, “…When we got to the base where the line wasn’t working, it was almost in me to give up but I…I just told Komari ‘what the hell? Let’s go further’. At that point, I was just going to fight to survive until there was no point to anymore and that I’d…I’d have Komari’s back. After…after Komari was shot, she told me a story about her girlfriend. I knew from what she said that…that her girlfriend was waiting for her so I swore I’d get her back to her girlfriend.”  
  
Yamada nodded slowly as Shin…paused. His tired eyes registered a bit of surprise. Hmm? “…And?”  
  
He opened his mouth but no words came out. Hesitance. Leaning closer, Yamada looked at him, “What was it, Shin?”  
  
His eyes scrunched up and he slowly leaned back, pressing the ice pack to his cheek as he looked away. What? “…When…when I was so tired and so…so done with trying…we came across the Zech’s soldiers. Dozens of them. I was ready then to lay down and die. Komari even suggested we just…off ourselves to not give them the satisfaction. It…it tempted me.”  
  
Yamada struggled to swallow that as Shin seemed…bemused, “…Then, I just…thought about…her.”  
  
“Her? Komari?”  
  
“…Well, yes, she…she was always there. But…not just her. The…the reason I started shooting, kept fighting, I…I started to think about Lyla.”  
  
Eh? Eyes widening as Shin bit his bruised lip, Yamada drawled, “…Oh.”  
  
“I…I should have been thinking about my family, I’m certain” Shin insisted quickly, “I-I don’t know what made me think of Lyla. Just…just it struck me that I…I never would see her again and it’s been two years. I have…so many questions about what took place and I…it made me get up and start shooting until we got rescued. I guess…what kept me going was my family and friends, as sappy as it sounds.”  
  
“It’s not sappy at all” Yamada murmured.  
  
“No. Because I come back and I’m hurting that same family that kept me going” he hissed, “And I let my friend lose her leg and…and I probably won’t ever see Lyla again.”  
  
…As Matsushima said, it was a terrible burden to saddle another human being with. Being someone’s purpose or motivation…one of his good friends growing up, Mariko, had placed that task on another man and she quickly came to realize it was a fool’s errand when the other person didn’t feel the same. Attaining a person…could not be someone’s motivation.  
  
Just, at the end of the day, at the end of this story, the thought of one person kept his son from killing himself or being shot down immediately. At the crux of his own story had been to get his wife back.   
  
Maybe…it was an okay motivation if both sides were looking for one another.  
  
_“Man, we are going to get our asses arrested.”  
  
This was an awful, awful, _awful_ idea.  
  
Shin had protested that it was just _too risky_. His father told him rather sternly the only way he was forgiving what he did to his _wife,_ not Shin’s mother, but Yagami Yamada’s _wife_ , was if he went out and…and tried to see Lyla.  
  
So, he put on a pair of shades, a thick black hoodie, dark wash jeans, and entered Koji’s car as if he were one of the other kids and sank low in the back seat. Nelly was home for a brief break so the twin duo jumped into the front seats and gunned it up the road to the ‘wifely school’.  
  
It was weird being in a car after this long, it felt like he was flying and it made him incredibly dizzy. But he stayed low regardless, making sure to stay out of the window. This was definitely not what his colonel told him to do, but…  
  
They got there probably a little too early, it looked as if school was still in session. So, Koji parked across the street and they waited. Nelly had made the remark about the arrest which would just be _fantastic_ because he was pretty sure in the eyes of the law and world, Yagami Shin was supposed to be underwater right now. God, this was stupid.  
  
“I-I don’t even know what to say” Shin hissed, “I-I think this is a bad idea.”  
  
“You’re just nervous” Koji yawned, smoking a cigarette as he toyed with the radio.  
  
Nervous? Meeting his best friend and once upon a time love interest? Maybe…maybe because all of those titles were prefixed by ‘former’. Maybe…it was why it was ‘former’ that…that scared him. Or…  
  
“Oh wow, there she is.”  
  
What?! Shin quickly looked all around before his eyes just attracted right to her.  
  
When he first met Okamoto Lyla, he thought she was this…beautiful fairy. Her light pink hair was longer, about to her waist, with a random braid starting at the front and disappearing to the back as she wandered out of a school building. She was wearing a thin coat and from what he could see, her eyes weren’t focused on anything.  
  
 _And I’d give up forever to touch you ‘cause I know that you feel me somehow. You’re the closest to heaven that I’ll ever be and I don’t want to go home right now…  
  
And all I can taste is this moment. And all I can breathe is your life. And sooner or later it’s over. I just don’t wanna miss you tonight…  
  
_She…was… _still_ his beautiful fairy. How? How…how could he approach her when he…  
  
 _And I don’t want the world to see me ‘cause I don’t think that they’d understand. When everything’s meant to be broken…I just want you to know who I am.  
_  
His heart was racing as Nelly looked back at him, frowning, “…What do you want us to do, Shin? You want us to call her over?”  
  
Call her over…? Now? Was this happening?  
  
 _And you can’t fight the tears that ain’t coming, or the moment of truth in your lies. When everything feels like the movies, yea, you bleed just to know you’re alive.  
  
_ She sat down on a bench, taking out headphones. It…was the absolute perfect opportunity, no one was really around right now, but…  
  
 _And I don’t want the world to see me ‘cause I don’t think that they’d understand. When everything’s meant to be broken…I just want you to know who I am.  
  
_ ‘Hi, Lyla. No, I’m not dead. What happened? Well, I was in the desert, wandering and kind of lost like we used to play we were as kids. Oh no, there weren’t tigers to escape. No, I stabbed some guy in the throat and murdered close to a hundred people on my tour. Yea, I was hallucinating too and now I need drugs to do basic functions. I’m so stressed I in fact just strangled my mother the other day. How have you been?’  
  
 _And I don’t want the world to see me ‘cause I don’t think that they’d understand. When everything’s meant to be broken, I just want you to know who I am…  
  
_ “…I’m sorry, Koji, Nelly” he rasped, shaking, “I-I can’t do it. I just can’t. Can we please leave?”  
  
Neither said anything, silently pulling back on to the road and away from this nightmare. Looking out the back window, gazing as her form became a speck in the distance, he breathed shakily.  
  
 _I just want you to know I am. I just want you to know I am. I just want you to know who I am…  
  
_ Shit.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
Yagami Shin felt like he was under someone’s thumb. Pressed down and barely breathing. He was listless and frustrated. He…  
  
…He honest to God had no idea what to do with his life now.  
  
It was going on month two and he was admittedly stir crazy. Aside from his three attempts to hype himself up to speak to Lyla, he hadn’t left the house. Well, he went outside to their jungle sometimes to cry so, that was great.   
  
Wandering down the steps, he caught sight of Koji. Bless his younger brother, Koji looked at him, laughed, and said, “I am so sick of you” before just going to lounge on the couch. His mom scolded Koji but the feeling was mutual, Shin had found himself chuckling. Yea, they were going to lose it.  
  
…He…really wanted things to change, just…  
  
There was a knock at the door. There hadn’t been a knock at the door in two months. Shin quickly dodged to hide in the cove of the stairs, holding his breath. Maybe…just a salesman. His heart was racing again. No, stupid, it…it wouldn’t be _her_ …  
  
Koji yawned as he wandered to the front door, opening the barrier. “…Hello.”  
  
“Hey. You Yagami Shin’s brother?” said a masculine voice.  
  
Crap. “…Yea. Come to pay your respects?”  
  
“Yea, dude did me a real solid once. Saved my life, in fact. I owe him.”  
  
…Sugo? Shin’s brows furrowed, having to dig in his memory bank which eventually made him ill. Wow, he really had to dig to think of the people he’d _saved_. This…this was why…  
  
“Please, come in” Koji replied.  
  
“Thanks.”  
  
Shin turned his cheek against the wall, frowning when he heard dual ‘clacks’ against their wood floors. Man, who even was this…? He…he had barely saved _anyone_ , not anyone that would just walk in here.  
  
“Komari, right?”  
  
…Eh? Shin froze. What? Was Koji crazy? It sounded like a guy!   
  
“Aww, hell, I thought I did a good job with my undercover man voice.”  
  
“Ehh, I can sense women.”  
  
“You’re definitely Koji.”  
  
… _What_? Shin…couldn’t believe it. He cautiously peeked around the corner, just not sure he could fathom…  
  
Standing there, wearing a gigantic gray hoodie with the hood pulled up and matching ginormous sweatpants with wide dark aviator glasses, a face mask hanging off her ear, a backpack, and two crutches was none other than Yamada Komari.  
  
The woman smiled, pushing her glasses up, “Well, fucking Yagami Shin. Miss me?”  
  
“Oh my God, Komari” he rasped, quickly coming down.  
  
God, he…had no idea how familiar her presence had become. He hugged her tightly, wondering if he’d just started hallucinating again…the woman embraced his neck, sighing. “…As much as I’d love to stand here and hug you, bud, I’m not quite light enough on my one foot.”  
  
Jesus Christ. Shin yelped, alarmed as he pulled away, “Oh my God, I’m sorry. Here, let me help.”  
  
“Ay, ay” she grunted as he started to pick her up, pushing him a bit, “I’ve got enough problems with tripping and hallucinating, I don’t need us recapturing our carrying experience in the desert.”  
  
…Shit. Koji tilted his head as Shin tried to…grasp this. “The living room is close by. Let’s get you relaxed in there.”  
  
“Much obliged!”  
  
Komari wheeled herself behind Koji, Shin following weakly. So…he wasn’t the only one, huh? His partner in horror whistled, “ _Shit,_ this place is _huge_. You really are a rich kid, Yagami.”  
  
“Y-Yea…”  
  
Koji offered her the elongated piece of the couch so she could stretch out her remaining limb, taking her crutches to lean against the wall. Sitting beside her, Shin smiled…some. “A-Ah, Komari, my manners. This is my little brother, Koji. Koji, as you figured out, this is Komari.”  
  
“Nice to finally meet you” Koji bowed, “Thanks for all you did for Shin.”  
  
“All _I_ did for Shin? I hope he hasn’t come here and made me the sole hero” she sulked.  
  
“You are” Shin grumbled.  
  
Komari smirked, shoving his shoulder, “Stop it. It’s nice to meet you, Koji. Shin talked about you and your other siblings quite a bit.”  
  
“Likewise. I have to check on something but I’ll come back in a few.”  
  
Shin nodded, murmuring ‘thanks’ as Koji disappeared into the kitchen. Komari took off her glasses, pushing the hood back. To his surprise, though she kept her hair short in general, she had an almost Peter Pan cut. “Okay, Sinead O’Connor.”  
  
“Shut the hell up” she snickered, “You must think I have no idea who that is, ass. My hair is still denser than that, _Fabio_.”  
  
Chuckling, shaking his head as he leaned back, Shin replied, “…I dunno, I can somehow manage to shave but cutting my hair has been a task. Until I can get my mind straight, I’ll accept ‘Fabio’. The Mia Farrow is cute too.”  
  
“And you look good with a ponytail” she assured, sighing, “…I just needed a fresh start.”  
  
…Eh? Shin stared, first thinking about the implication of her cutting her hair and what that _usually_ meant…before something more pressing hit him. “…Yamada, what the hell are you doing here??”  
  
The hell?! How’d she _get_ here!! Tsuyukasa was _hours_ from here, she _had_ to blow their cover!! Komari _shrugged_. “I walked to the train station in my town early before anyone was awake, paid my fare, rode up here and got on a bus, then took a taxi. Incognito, no calls, just a covered ghost on a transport.”  
  
Shin frowned, slowly nodding again, “…Why though?”  
  
Komari laughed dryly, standing after grabbing a crutch and walking slowly to the deck door to stare out. He trembled, staring at the vacant pant leg. Damn it. “Well, Yagami, my house is about the size of this room. The second floor is the same size…and that’s it. 59 square feet, 640 square feet. One of the biggest houses in Tsuyukasa to boot but, well, my dad’s still got to play it cool and mind the restaurant and mom has to continue to be a jetsetter to play the part. So, imagine being in this living room for two months…with my fucking girlfriend.”  
  
“…Shit, my brother and I agreed we’re sick of each other this morning in _this_ house” Shin droned.  
  
She didn’t say anything before coming back over, grunting as she rested back across the chaise…and suddenly curling into his side. Shin stared down at her before grimacing, rubbing her shoulder, “…So you heard.”  
  
“Yea. The day after we got back, my dad thought it was a great thing to spring on me then and there” she mumbled, “…A fucking air raid. They got Mako from the sky, bunch of motherfucking _cowards_.”  
  
“I’m so sorry, Komari” he whispered, resting his cheek on top of her head, “I…I really wanted you to be able to sit down with him. I…I was devastated to hear he was killed before you could do that.”  
  
Komari choked, suddenly crying, “You didn’t even _know_ him. You met him _once_ and you’ve given me more lines of compassion than she has in _two fucking months_.”  
  
Oh no… she hissed, “We all grew up together—Hina, Mako, Kasumi—I get it, Shin, I _get it_. I know what Kasumi grew up with, what she’s been through, but she was _completely_ unbothered. Just-just one less man I’ve had sex with at her behest that might have wanted to have sex with me again in her sight!”  
  
Damn. Shin grimaced, “W-Well…”  
  
Sitting up, she glowered, “I have spent _two months_ listening to that _bullshit_ , Shin. If it wasn’t about me being ‘suspiciously sad’ about Mako, every _single day_ I got to get an earful about how I spent two months in the desert with you.”  
  
…Pardon? “…Was there some…confusion? We weren’t on a luxury cruise” Shin’s eyes narrowed.  
  
Komari rubbed her eyes, muttering, “Yea, well, you tell that brilliant human being that. In her mind, we had to have fucked at least twice a day.”  
  
“Yea, between the extreme dehydration, burning skin, starvation, insanity, occasional bloodbath, and burying bodies, that was on my to do list” he scoffed, rolling his eyes.  
  
The woman stared at the ceiling, her head slung back, before she shook it. “She’s jealous, Shin.”  
  
“Of _what_?” he demanded, “What in _any_ of our situations would even _slightly_ amount to something to be _jealous_ of, Komari? We were all about to be _dead_.”  
  
She gave him a look. “Shin, look, was it _ideal_ that we crashed in the desert? No, not even _slightly_. Aside from the obliteration of our squad, however, Kasumi was in the better set of circumstances. They had _endless_ water. They had made _shelter_ out of the cargo—one of the guys managed to rig up something akin to _air conditioning_. They were suffering but they weren’t _our_ suffering.”  
  
“I…I mean, I don’t want to qualitatively say that…” Shin said reluctantly.  
  
“Did you look at Kasumi?” Komari demanded, “Did you look at her when we got back? Yea, she was mildly burned but that was it. We went through _HELL,_ Shin.”  
  
“…Yes.”  
  
“And it eats her up inside that you got me through hell.”  
  
Shin had a headache. Rubbing his temple, he droned, “I don’t even want that credit, Komari.”  
  
“Because you’re annoying” Komari leered, pointing at him, “She knows damn well I didn’t go through the desert by myself. I told her I gave up _dozens_ of times once we left the base. That whole journey was you playing motivational speaker and being your same overachieving _ass_. No one, and I mean _no one_ , else would have _carried me_ around the desert, Shin. If you were really going to be sentimental, you would have lied beside me and _died_ but _carrying me_? Absolutely not. She will not ever get over that.”  
  
His mind was not accepting this…seeming praise. “Mari…”  
  
“She tried to get me to turn. Told my mom and dad that, because of _you_ , I lost a leg--”  
  
True. “—Over and fucking _over again_ , Shin! Shin!” she gestured her hands around her head. She was still crying. “ _I_ have to live with the one leg, Shin—ME. _Me_. I am _missing a part of my body_ —stop _talking about it_!”  
  
Shin’s eyes widened, shocked. He shakily grabbed a tissue from a box nearby on the lamp stand, handing it to her. He felt queasy. Right…right. He felt guilty causing it, certainly, but…why was he making that about him? She said she didn’t blame him but she was the one that had to live with the outcome. Hugging her tightly, he rubbed her back again as she just cried. Jeez, Kasumi…just at least be a _shoulder_.  
  
“I…I’m sorry you’re going through that, Komari. Honestly, I am, that’s…that’s just not fair. I…I’d fix a lot of things if I could.”

Komari sniveled, wiping her eyes miserably, “I know. But you did a lot in the situation.”  
  
Ugh. “…I understand her story, Komari. I really, really, _really_ do, okay? I…I ran into something similar here where I just…just didn’t want to put a strain on the person. However, it…it turns out they were very well-equipped to listen to me and…I won’t ever say it’s been _better_ but I’m in a less rocky place. But Yamada—Kasumi should not be putting you on rockier ground. You don’t owe that to her.”  
  
“I can handle Sumi” she assured, shrugging her shoulders, “…But maybe she just can’t handle who I am.”  
  
Wincing at that assertation, Shin looked at his lap. Komari suddenly exhaled, “…Fwoo. I do feel a little better. Okay. How are things with Lyla?”  
  
Oops. Shin, in a both indeliberate yet somehow deliberate way, looked completely in the opposite direction at the wall away from Komari. Oops. “Um, what?”  
  
“…Uh…aside from my immediate family, I am…still very much dead to everyone else.”  
  
“…I _beg your pardon_?”  
  
Groaning, Shin stood as Komari glared incredulously at him. “You’re talking about _Sumi_ being cold-blooded—you’re going to let your best friend think you’re still _dead_? I thought you said she lives right next door!”  
  
“S-She sort of does? Apparently she got into some thing with her dad and doesn’t come around as much?” Shin drawled, a bit pitchy.  
  
“So your brothers couldn’t have gone to see her wherever and been like, ‘oh, hey, we’re having a vigil for Shin, we only want you to come’ and boom?” she demanded.  
  
Shin crossed his arms, going to stare through the drawn blinds. The flora in their little jungle was almost glittering in the midday. “…Are you different now, Komari?”  
  
“What?”  
  
“After the desert, are you different now?”  
  
Komari snorted, “Well, dunno, Shin, I’m probably not riding anymore bikes, but…”  
  
“Not…not _physically_. I mean, after this, after we got back—are you still majority the Komari that was there before we started to wander the desert?”  
  
“…Probably not majority.”  
  
“I know I’m not” he whispered.  
  
Bowing his head, he swallowed, “…Her Shin was…was the version that bought us walkie-talkies so we could communicate in the middle of the night. Her Shin was the guy that made sure she got to go to her first concert and got to wear a bathing suit. Her Shin made her favorite dinners. Her Shin was the guy she was afraid would put himself at risk to do the right thing.”  
  
Breathing, he barely got out, “…Her…her Shin wasn’t the one that came back…”  
  
“ _What_? Shin--”  
  
“ _Her_ Shin—would have _never_ just—just _mindlessly_ killed people and buried them. _Her_ Shin was supposed to be a _decent person_ and turned around to be a mass killer! Her Shin would never have gotten so fucked up in the brain that he needs _drugs_ to live with himself now. Her Shin would have never even _needed_ to ask his little brother to put his life on hold to make sure he doesn’t snap and hurt their family. Her Shin would have _never_ hurt his family but just got into a fist fight with that same little brother after hallucinating so bad he strangled his _mother_. I could _never_ meet her the way I am now and I don’t _deserve to_.”  
  
“Wow. Look here, Yagami” Komari grunted, pulling herself to sit on the end of the chaise, “…Okay. I do get it. Frankly? Couldn’t even sleep beside Kasumi for a few days, it felt like…unnatural. I felt like one of us should have been awake and that every slight crick in the house was someone trying to murder me. What Itoh Kasumi was used to is ol’ cuddle bug. It’s different because she also had similar reactions from similar experiences. Her processing was she wanted it to go back to the way things used to be. I can’t—I’m not there yet and I doubt I’ll ever be there yet either. We were on an equal playing field in some domain so it _might_ be harder for her to empathize with your experiences.”  
  
Shin quietly digested that. Komari murmured, “But you can’t _tell me_ that the Yagami Shin—the Yagami Shin that Lyla once knew—didn’t come back.”  
  
Ha! “He really, really didn’t, Komari.”  
  
“Bullshit. Because that was the same Yagami Shin that got us through the desert in the first place.”  
  
His eyes scrunched, shaking his head. No, he didn’t. “Look at me, Shin, and really think about it because I know you now: you are self-depreciating. You did things you’re not proud of and thought you were never capable of. But it’s real easy to detach and say ‘well, the old me did this’ or ‘never would I have ever--’—bullshit, Yagami! The same Yagami Shin that went into that desert came out of that desert. If he was a different person, none of that former Shin would even matter. And if you’re standing here telling me that Lyla would judge that you’re no longer a decent person because _her_ Shin would never, not that he was injured, broken down, and damaged and came back with the scars of experience— _fuck her_.”  
  
“…I’m just so ashamed, Mari.”  
  
“You can be honest” she suddenly smirked, “Because I was _right there_ with you. Am I no longer a ‘decent person’ in your sight? I mean, I could see me never having been one so there’s that.”  
  
“Of course you’re a decent person!” he gaped back at her.  
  
Komari pressed her hand against her chest, her eyes closing some, “Oh, so I need to think of myself as ‘other Komari’ and hate myself because of what I did? I was cutting throats and blowing out brains _with you_ , Yagami. You can’t _not_ hold me to some high standard and then swing around and call yourself some kind of monster when we’re guilty of the same things, hypocrite.”  
  
Yeesh. “…I guess you’re right.”  
  
Her eyes softened, gesturing him closer. He sighed, walking over. She grasped his hand, giving it a squeeze, “Bro, _I_ am happy to see you and I just spent two months with you two months ago. If this is the same person that gave you the family heirloom meant for her husband because you’re the only person she felt would ever deserve it, meaning you’re probably the only person in her life that came close to being capable of deserving that position? She will not give one damn that her Shin isn’t the same exact boy from two years ago, only that she got him back.”  
  
“I don’t know…” he mumbled.  
  
“Look what I’m working through with Kasumi, Shin” Komari sighed heavily, “…I’m dealing with trauma for her too. I _know_ you wouldn’t do that to Lyla…but I believe, from what you’ve told me, she will want to take the time to get to know where you are now.”  
  
Yea…that’s something else he was afraid of. “Oh my goodness!”  
  
They both jumped, alarmed. Looking over his shoulder, he found his mother entering the room with Koji. Eh? Yagami Dana’s eyes were aglow, “Are you Komari?”  
  
“A-Ah, yes, I am” Komari quickly smiled.  
  
Shin was startled as his mother rushed to her, hugging Komari tight, “Thank you so much for being with my baby in the desert.”  
  
Mama… Komari looked cross, “Ma’am, I feel like your…overzealous son may have incorrectly portrayed my part in this journey. I…I owe my life to him.”  
  
 _Hardly_. “I doubt he incorrectly portrayed you, dear. Just…his father and I always made sure Shin was never alone and I…I won’t say he wouldn’t have but I don’t know if he would have made it without someone else.”  
  
Komari’s eyes widened. Shin smiled softly. “She’s right.”  
  
Koji stuffed his hands in his pockets, nodding, “You’ll be staying with us for a little while, won’t you?”  
  
“Oh, I didn’t want to intrude, I was…slightly thinking about leaving the country” she droned.  
  
What now? Both Koji and his mother looked confused as Shin smirked, “Really, Komari? You can stay with us as long as you need, it’s not slightly a disposition.”  
  
“Perhaps…just a few days then” Komari said reluctantly, “If I’m gone too long, the others may get worried.”  
  
“Excellent! I’ll go get something nice for dinner then” Dana clapped.  
  
Shin teased, “On our worst days, she’d drag on about her favorite foods of doji nabe, osechi, and okonomiyaki so if that gives you any inspiration…”  
  
Komari sulked at him, sticking out her tongue, “No, no, I’m the bother here now--”  
  
“Nonsense” Dana assured, “That sounds way different than what we’ve been eating lately. I’ll be back in a bit.”  
  
Shin smiled sadly as his mom kissed his cheek, advising him to relax with his friend. She was too good to her terrible son…  
  
Blinking languidly at Koji, he drawled, “…You can go…loiter. I know this has been seriously killing you.”  
  
Koji’s brows quirked, apparently not denying it. “…You sure you’re good?”  
  
“Yea.” Komari was probably the only one that wouldn’t…be in direct danger.   
  
“I won’t be gone long regardless. I’ll get us some beer for tonight too” Koji replied, nodding.

Shin agreed and he wasn’t startled that his brother was to the exit in like four seconds despite a fairly decent walk between the living room and front door. Sighing, Shin sat back down beside Komari and scratched his head, “…So leave the country, huh?”  
  
“Crossed my mind” she muttered, “…I hadn’t slept well this week. I slept in the closet one day this week just to feel…secure, I guess? Not _only_ Kasumi laid into me, my mom and dad, they were like, ‘enough, you’re just being crazy now’ and ‘it’s all an act, start acting like our Komari’, blah, blah, blah. I told them I’d kill all of them, I’m leaving and never coming back, and to go to hell.”  
  
Groaning, Shin squeezed the bridge of his nose, “…I’ll…have one of my siblings call and we’ll come up with some coded way to say you’re safe.”  
  
“Tuh.”  
  
“I guess I took for granted how…accepting my family is being. My dad’s only threatened me once and not really but that was still after I put my hands around my own mother’s throat” he muttered lowly.  
  
“What happened? She seems so sweet” Komari frowned.  
  
“She _is_ so sweet, I was asleep and dreaming about an army infiltration. I guess I was thrashing and she came to wake me up but, of course…”  
  
Komari nodded solemnly, “…I’m so scared of that. They annoy the fuck out of me but I would never want to hurt my family. They don’t understand that’s why I sleep in closets. I’m…I’m trying to cope and…and deprogram.”  
  
Her soft brown eyes looked sad suddenly. “…Huh. I guess you’re right. Maybe…maybe I didn’t come back.”  
  
Grimacing, Shin shook his head, “No, you…you made a lot of good points, Komari, really. My brother made a great point too though: I…I don’t think we ever left the desert. In our minds, we’re…we’re still soldiers.”  
  
His friend’s eyes widened before she smiled, “…Fucking A. Where’s the switch for that?”  
  
“…Closure, I guess. When…we can finally close this chapter out.”  
  
When…they weren’t pressed down anymore. The only problem from there was…what do you do with freedom when you still didn’t know who you were?  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
The weed still helped because Koji kept him weaned enough to not depend on it. Mostly the hard drugs the army gave him really put him under. It was a tad disturbing, but, at some point Komari had dozed off while they were speaking and he fell asleep right beside her. He…hadn’t been able to do anything close in weeks.   
  
He couldn’t put his finger on why. It couldn’t be that he felt she was more his equal than, say, his own damn family. No, he felt Komari far surpassed him in ways but, again, he also felt the same way about his family. He definitely didn’t want to hurt her but he sure as all hell hadn’t wanted to hurt his mother. Maybe he felt she could take him? If he were perfectly honest though, assessing it now, Koji held BACK because he knew Shin was out of his mind. No, he had seen Koji fight, he had FAR more insanity in his arsenal than what he’d given Shin and that was considering Koji still whooped his ass. No, Komari…  
  
…He guessed Kasumi wouldn’t ever like him. Komari felt like a part of him now. Yes, his family was a part of him too but…the experience he and Komari shared would never be something he had with them. Kinship. She…she understood a hundred percent where he was coming from because she’d been there beside him.  
  
At six, around three hours later, he started to stir, groggy. Komari was kind of cuddled up into his side and it felt like his cheek had been on top of her head. Rubbing his face, he sleepily glanced around to assess his surroundings…and found MOST of his siblings, appearing pensive as they sat on various articles of furniture throughout the room. Oh lord.  
  
“…Good evening” he greeted lowly.  
  
‘Hey’, ‘hello’, they all droned, kind of side-eying him. What? Shin glowered at them, “…Get your minds out of the gutter. This is Komari.”  
  
“What gutter?” Tony sang dryly.  
  
“Aren’t you supposed to be in a school somewhere?”  
  
Tony stuck out his tongue as Jill snickered, doing homework at the coffee table. “I had an off day today, thank you very much.”  
  
Shaun yawned, turning the page on his book as he sat in the recliner, “That your new best friend?”  
  
He felt like he was being charged with something. He didn’t like it. “Can’t I have MULTIPLE friends or are we all stuck to like one forever friend?”  
  
“Not when one of your forever friends hasn’t been around in forever…” chimed Nelly, the prick lying on the other end of the couch on the chaise, slouched.  
  
“Stop being assholes.”  
  
Shin glanced up as Koji appeared with that decree, a beer in hand. “…Huh. Surprised you came back so soon. Figured you’d want to make up for lost time.”  
  
“I can cover a lot of ground in a very short time” Koji smiled.  
  
Gross. Nelly snickered, “And you don’t think he’s out getting pussy on Saturday after class? Please.”  
  
Tony snorted, “Yea, you really thought Koji here would go cold turkey?”  
  
“Shut your individual holes.”  
  
Shin smirked, his eyes half closed. He actually _had_ assumed Koji was two months celibate but that was actually very naïve now that he was considering it. Suddenly he heard a snicker. “You didn’t lie, you have a hella amount of siblings…”  
  
Looking to his side, he found Komari had roused, curled under the blanket he’d rested over her before he fell asleep. “Sorry, we’re loud, I didn’t mean to wake you.”  
  
“Mm, it’s fine, my hip kind of is starting to hurt” she grumbled, turning over on her side.  
  
He shot his siblings a quick warning glare, noting that they all, minus Koji, looked stunned when there was very clearly a missing part of her leg. He hoped they understood to not stare or mention it. “I’ll get you some pain meds.”  
  
“Nah, I’m fine” she assured though her face was scrunched, “Introduce me to everyone.”  
  
“O-Oh, right. This guy that looks just like Koji, this is Nelly. That’s Tony. You know the only girl is Jill. And the blue haired kid is the youngest, Shaun. Everyone, this is my friend from the army to the desert, Yamada Komari.”  
  
Nelly nodded, “It’s nice to meet you. Shin’s told us a lot about you.”  
  
The kids all chimed in in agreement. Komari smiled, “It’s nice to finally meet all of you. A very cute family, Shin.”  
  
“I guess” he stuck out his tongue.  
  
She laughed as they all heckled that he wasn’t cute, sitting up. “Adorable. You mind if I use your restroom?”  
  
“Of course not” scoffed Shin, standing, “Do you--”  
  
“If you’re about to ask me if I need help using the toilet, I’ll knock you out in front of your siblings.”  
  
“Fine, fine” he sighed gravely, grabbing her crutches from where they were leaning against the wall to at least help with that, “Here, I’ll show you.”  
  
Shaky on her feet, she nodded as he offered to just show her to the guest bathroom in case she wanted to freshen up and where she could sleep. It was…still dismal to watch her kind of hobble up the stairs, stopping every few paces to take a breath before continuing.   
  
“Jeez-z-z-z, bro” Komari gawked as they entered one of the rooms in his wing next to his main bedroom, “This is like my entire FUCKING HOUSE.”  
  
“Yea, I’m actually not sure who this was built to house” he mused, setting her bag on the bed, “Sure there are eight of us but there’s like thirteen rooms or something.”  
  
She snorted, “Fucking rich kid. You could have definitely gone a whole different route, Yagami.”  
  
“…Yea.”  
  
Komari punched his shoulder, winking, “Of course, then I would have never met you and possibly ended up dead out in the desert without you around. Time paradoxes are nuts.”  
  
Somehow he could chuckle at that, “I wouldn’t count on it, ‘Mari. I…In some crevice of my mind, I think I’d have joined regardless even if I knew this is where I’d be mentally and emotionally.”  
  
“Because you were the right person for the job, Shin.”  
  
…Maybe. She shooed him to go back to his siblings while she washed up. While he wanted to say ‘call me so I could get you down the steps safely’, that…probably was belittling. He wasn’t sure but…it was just difficult to know what was appropriate here.  
  
Going back down the steps, he smiled as his mama appeared to be cooking loach in the large pot, preparing to set it on the table. “Smells delicious, mama…thank you.”  
  
“Of course, Sweetie Plum” Dana smiled, “Your friend seems a bit thin. I messaged your papa to come home and give her a checkup.”  
  
“O-Oh, maybe…” Again…was that appropriate?  
  
Reentering the living room, he found his siblings seeming to be whispering. Yea, he figured they were going to be nosy. “Look, I appreciate you all not saying anything about Komari’s leg…and I would like for it to remain that way.”  
  
“Of course not, bro” leered Nelly, “We’re not a bunch of assholes, contrary to what Koji said. We were just discussing if maybe pop could get her a prosthetic made on the low.”  
  
What? Koji nodded, “That’s a lot of pressure to put on one leg, Shin. Usually people with amputations use a wheelchair or a prosthetic. She’s a BEAST walking around on one limb even if she needs crutches but it has to be painful.”  
  
…Oh no. Shaun looked…enlightened. “I can build her one!”  
  
“You are not a medical engineer, Shaun” Tony yawned.  
  
“Is that a thing??”  
  
“Medical technology and clinical engineering is a little more succinct.”  
  
Shin jolted a bit when his father walked in, holding his medical bag. “Hello. Your mother sent some elusive message to Matsushima that he HAD to decode on his own. All I could gather is I’d need my diagnostic tools.”  
  
“H-Hey, dad. Um, yea, my friend Komari came. She…looks okay to me but you never know. She hasn’t seen a doctor, I imagine” Shin explained.  
  
Yamada groaned, rubbing his face, “Then I have NOWHERE near what I need…where is she?”  
  
“Ah, upstairs.”  
  
Dana entered, wiping her hands, “Dinner will be ready in about fifteen minutes.”  
  
Kissing his wife’s cheek, Yamada nodded. “That should be enough for a prerequisite visit. Show me where she is, Shin.”  
  
Nodding, Shin paused, recalling. “Oh yea, can you guys concoct a message to send to Komari’s family that she’s alive but…you know, not telling them she’s alive because we’re not alive?”  
  
His brothers looked very puzzled but Jill gasped. “I live for writing riddles.”  
  
“I’ll leave it in your capable hands then” Shin winked, starting to follow his father.  
  
“How is she just out and about traveling by herself?” Yamada questioned as they went up the steps. “I thought that was a big no-no.”  
  
“Uh, she…got a little frustrated in her circumstances and took a long, impractical, but covert way to get here.”  
  
Yamada raised a brow as he knocked lightly on the door, “Ah, Komari, I, um, have someone I want you to meet and wants to check on you.”  
  
“Come in!”  
  
Opening the door, he found Komari wearing a loose skirt and shirt, sitting on the side of the bed looking through a bag. She looked up and smiled, “Oh, you’re Shin’s dad.”  
  
Yamada smiled, nodding, “Yagami Yamada. It’s a pleasure to meet you. Thank you for… being there for my son.”  
  
…Somehow it sounded a bit stunted, like his father wasn’t actually that…grateful? What?? Mama got it, Shin had needed her to survive as far as he had! Getting a bit aggravated, about to say ‘they needed a moment’, Komari suddenly tipped her head. “I’m a quitter.”  
  
…What? “Your son is a force to be reckoned with in situations I didn’t see a possibility in. He kept pushing when I figured I’d either just be captured, raped, and murdered if I just didn’t end it for myself right there. I’d have rather quit than let that be my end.”  
  
What was she talking about?! Yamada winced. What! “…I understand completely, that’s…a very different set of circumstances due to gender. It…wasn’t easy to hear from Shin but your perspective… that’s a perspective I know of as well.”  
  
Really? Because Shin was confused now. Yamada walked over to her, “…Shin was in atrocious shape when he first got here. Medical negligence at BEST. Have you been examined?”  
  
Komari shook her head to the negative. “I would like to take a look at all the incisions, if you don’t mind. A transfemoral amputation is nothing I would just send you home with either.”  
  
“Fair…do you want me to take off the skirt?”  
  
“If you don’t mind.”  
  
She managed to work the band down and Shin finally realized his dad had probably seen a lot of other women beside his mom naked. The hell! However, Yamada looked completely unbothered and, in fact, looked back at him. “Would you like Shin to step out of the room?”  
  
“Oh no, he’s seen all of it and then some” she yawned, down to her underwear.  
  
Yep…still special. Blushing as his dad raised a brow back at him, Shin drawled, “Y-You’re funny, Yamada.”  
  
“What? Oh…oh yea, that’s your last name” his dad shook his head.  
  
“Oh yea, did Shin ever tell you when we first met, he thought you’d somehow joined the army without him knowing and was his roommate?”  
  
Shin smirked at her as his father chuckled, opening his bag, “Well…I am capable of many things but I don’t know if military duty is one of them. I probably did come off that crazy when he joined though.”  
  
Seriously. Yamada looked at what remained of her limb, murmuring, “You can feel my hands?”  
  
“Mm.”  
  
Examining her other leg, his dad’s face got a bit darker. “…Your knee is swollen and full of fluid as is your ankle. All they gave you were crutches?”  
  
Komari nodded to confirm this as he shook his head, taking out his stethoscope. “Uncanny.”  
  
He did a general checkup and surprisingly drew some blood. “I’m going to drop these off to Matsushima and he can advise me of the results.”  
  
Shin frowned as his dad pulled out measuring tape and placed it at the base of her leg, rolling it down to the heel of her foot. Writing down something on his pad, he nodded, “I’ll be back shortly.”  
  
“Thank you” Komari bowed.  
  
“Of course, of course…take it easy though” he warned, “I don’t like the damage your other leg is taking. If possible, allow Shin to help you down.”  
  
Komari glowered at him as his dad left, droning as she redressed, “Great, I get to play damsel in distress. Guess I’ll get to play poor weak female again.”  
  
“Oh yea, you were real distressed and weak shooting people through the eyeball while I was carrying you” Shin said dryly, tucking his arms under her legs and supporting her back.  
  
She snickered, holding his neck, “Careful, Yagami, might sweep a girl off her feet carrying her bridal style and all.”  
  
“You’re silly” he snorted, walking toward the door. It…felt kind of weird and he felt terrible thinking that.  
  
Nonetheless, Komari sighed softly, “…Yea, it’s odd. Feels like something should be there, right?”  
  
Something _should_ be there. Komari stared down, drawling, “You know it still itches?”  
  
“What?”  
  
“My leg—the leg that’s gone. Sometimes it still itches.”  
  
Shin wasn’t certain what to say to that, swallowing as he approached the steps. “…Wherever we end up, Komari, I’ll…I’ll make sure you get what’s right.”  
  
She raised a brow as he grunted, turning the corner. “Don’t say anything down here, dad said don’t let her walk and I’ll fight all of you.”  
  
“What now?” Komari questioned.  
  
“Oh no, and us without our rice to throw” Koji mock-gasped, standing in the kitchen.  
  
Nelly started humming an off-key ‘Here Comes the Bride’ and Shin just stared at them through half-closed eyes. Komari cracked up, “As an only child, I have no grasp on the heckling but it’s hilarious you gave a warning and you still got it.”  
  
“It’s always in vain” he said monotonously.  
  
The evil duo snickered as Jill entered with a glittery blue note pad and a black pen, “Okay, I think I’ve come up with the most sufficient way to tell Yamada-san’s parents she’s still alive without indicating we know either of you are alive.”  
  
Before he could respond, a side door that opened to the garage swung out and Tony entered…with a wheelchair. Oh no. “U-Uh--”  
  
“If it’s not too forward, Yamada-san, I wanted to offer this for you to use at least while you’re here” Shaun said as he walked in behind Tony with the foot guards, “I got it for scrap parts to build something but it’s not in too bad shape.”  
  
Komari groaned. “I…had hoped to avoid the wheelchair but my leg is killing me so I appreciate it and will accept the hospitality.”  
  
Thank God. Shaun put it together quickly and Shin relaxed her in the chair. The red leather was a bit nicked up and torn but it wasn’t in the worst shape. Komari nodded, bowing her head, “Thank you all for your kindness.”  
  
“Of course!”  
  
“Why don’t you call your parents before we start dinner, dear?” Dana suggested, taking out a pitcher of juice, “I’m sure they’re worried.”  
  
“That’s a good idea…” Komari murmured.  
  
Jill took out her cell phone, handing it to Komari. Komari dialed in her number slowly and Jill took it back, putting the phone on speaker.  
  
“…Hello?” said a male voice.  
  
“Ah, hello, um…my name is Yagami Jill. I believe your daughter was in a transport with my older brother. We have been putting together a memorial for him and he often mentioned your daughter from his previous deployment before. My family wished to extend an invitation to you.”  
  
Shin swallowed as the man was silent for a bit. Hopefully that didn’t go over his head… “…That’s very kind of you, thank you. The…information you have about Komari for…the memorial, it’s okay?”  
  
“You can provide more if you’d like but we assure it’ll be fine.”  
  
“All right…is this in perhaps a day or so?”  
  
“Um…perhaps three days?”  
  
The man drawled, “…Maybe my wife and I will come a bit early. Tomorrow is too soon?”  
  
Shin smiled as he saw the vein starting to kind of tick in Komari’s temple. He mouthed to Jill ‘two days’. Jill nodded, “Well, for the family’s preparation, may I ask that you meet us in the middle at two days?”  
  
“…Very well.”  
  
Jill proceeded to give Yamada Ginjiro the address. The man said solemnly, “Thank you again, Yagami-san.”  
  
“Thank you as well and my condolences, Yamada-san.”  
 _  
_Jill clicked off as Komari kneaded her temples. “…Guess I better enjoy my break while I can then.”  
  
“Sorry, I tried” Jill pouted.  
  
“Oh no, Sweetie, you did great! Thank you!” Komari gasped, waving her hands, “My dad’s just crazy and is one third of the reason I ran away from home.”  
  
Shin patted Komari’s shoulder, kissing Jill’s forehead and murmuring ‘thanks’ to her. Pretending her brother was dead probably wasn’t the most mentally stabilizing thing in the world. “It’s probably for the best anyway, our cover might get blown.”  
  
His friend sighed deeply as she slowly rolled herself toward the table with everyone, a spot being made for her next to where he…might sit. His attendance at the table was pretty bad, actually. Smiling as his mama sat and gushed for them to ‘dig in’, he felt…pleased as his siblings chattered with Komari casually. Good…  
  
…He meant it. He…he wasn’t sure where he was going. That was a big problem. Just, wherever he went, if…if she was on board, he was going to take her with him.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

It was Friday. Days had lost all meaning to him so it was difficult to keep up with them in terms of what day it actually was. Generally, he could only manage because Nelly took Koji’s place on Saturdays. That would explain why Nelly was here, Koji was to leave and go back to school…  
  
That was…entirely sweet of his siblings to stick around because he had an honored guest. They never were around on a Friday but they sat down to dinner and were pretty entertaining. After dinner, he thanked them. “Aww, shut all that shit up, Shin, we’re not party crazy enough to be rude to people that helped you live” Koji scoffed.  
  
Nice. All the same, he urged Nelly and Koji to go out and enjoy themselves. They probably hadn’t gotten to hang out together in a while because of all this. He also assured the other trio it’d be just fine if they wanted to go along with their normal Friday antics, whatever that was now. They were reluctant but he pressed. He…he was still ‘nii-san’ and no matter what, he wanted them to live their lives and be happy.  
  
As he was helping his mother clean up, his dad got back with a bag. He looked mildly aggravated. “…Your vitamin levels aren’t where I would want them to be as a doctor but they’re sufficient for now. If you’ll be here a few days, I’ll watch for the fluid in your joints to go down. If not, I’ll do a small drainage to relieve the pressure. And it’s nothing fancy, but this may also suffice until this mission is completed.”  
  
To all of their genuine shock, his dad removed a prosthetic leg. It looked like a cup on the end of a metal foot. Komari looked teary-eyed. Oh no, dad! “D-Dad, that’s--” he started.

  
“I guess that’s…that’s going to be life now, huh?” Komari whispered.  
  
God. Yamada’s blue eyes softened, getting closer, “It’s going to sound like the self-serving nonsense doctors say to patients to reassure them in vain, Komari-san, but I assure you, in your lifetime, you will have a new limb not made of metal or plastic. You have my word. In the meantime, I want you to keep being mobile and this is just one way to do it. You have other options but I don’t want you straining yourself. You needn’t be in additional pain.”  
  
“…Thank you.”  
  
Shin swallowed hard as his dad helped her put it on, strapping it on to what remained of her lost limb. Damn it. This… he walked over, holding out his hands to help her up. She stuck out her tongue, “I got this, you.”  
  
“Okay.”  
  
Locking the wheelchair, she pushed herself up on the arm rests and grimaced a bit before looking startled. “…Oh.”  
  
“You’ll probably have to do some rehabilitation and training. It’ll be foreign” Yamada explained.  
  
“Yea, it is…” Komari drawled, taking a very small step before smiling, “…But I’ll get it. Thank you so much.”  
  
She hugged his father and he just…wished. He wished for so much to be different.   
  
Shin egged his parents to go out and do something fun together. It’d been too long. Dana scoffed, “You might as well just streak down the street with a blare horn if you expect your father and I going out to do something fun right now not raising all red flags.”  
  
Yamada snickered, patting his wife’s shoulder, “We can go for a drive.”  
  
Also a good idea. They departed and Komari ambled a bit, grunting, “…Jeez, it’s like I haven’t had anything like two legs in my life.”  
  
“Don’t overdo it…” he warned, going to the fridge and taking out two beers.  
  
“Bitch-h-h, I’ll be doing squats by tomorrow” she sang.  
  
With a smirk, he followed her into the living room. Sitting, she gasped, “Oh my God, the knee bends!”  
  
Just…the simple things, he guessed. Taking a seat beside her, handing her a bottle, he murmured, “…I don’t want to be another Kasumi, Komari, but I…I don’t know if I’ll ever get past my part in this.”  
  
Komari just yawned. Special. “Shin…I was about to take those bullets to the back. How would you feel having had to bury me out in the desert?”  
  
Shit. “…I guess I wouldn’t be thinking about feeling guilty right now” he admitted, taking a swig. “I won’t mention it anymore. I…I believe my dad’s words.”  
  
“It’s called phantom limb.”  
  
Eh? Shin raised a brow as she smiled some, “The itching or feeling like the leg is still there. I read about it in an encyclopedia we had sitting around because I was trying to figure out ‘why’. Your mind…still is holding onto something being there that isn’t.”  
  
…Shit. “And before I leave, Mr. Yagami, we’re going to deal with getting you closer to at least ONE of your ‘phantom limbs’ and getting it back like your dad said I might get mine back one day.”  
  
“My mind?” he droned.  
  
Swatting at him, Komari snickered, “No, doofus, I can’t help you there.”  
  
… “I…I don’t know if that ‘limb’ can come back that easily, Komari.”  
  
“You at least need to get laid, pal, those endorphins can get some surprising results. Is your absolute bombshell even remotely around?”  
  
Shin shook his head, “…Nesha sent a letter of condolence to my family but it was from America. She said she wasn’t coming back. Besides, it’d be…very strange to allow her into this circle of knowing. We were just, as shameful as it is to admit, fuck buddies…”  
  
“Aww, sweetie, she at least cared a bit to send a condolence letter. A little strange, actually” Komari raised a brow, “Had you heard from her before?”  
  
Shaking his head again to the negative, having not received one letter from her when he was at base, Komari looked a bit pensive. “Hmm. Weird.”  
  
Was it? He just…thought it was a sweet gesture. Granted, from what he did know of Nesha, that wasn’t really her nature. He laughed. Komari blinked slowly at him, “What?”  
  
“Sorry, was just thinking about how most women I’ve been with ‘lately’ are quite…terse.”  
  
“Maybe you just like them feisty” she teased.  
  
Maybe. He…guessed she was a bit feisty at times. _“I love you so much, Shin. I…I want you so bad…but I…I can’t…can’t have anything.”_  
  
…Oh yea, what…what had that meant? Groaning internally, he kneaded his brow. He had…so much to think about. Komari drank the beer before gasping, “Oh my God, remember when we had sex?”  
  
“Give me that beer.”  
  
“No!” she laughed, turning her body as he reached out for it, “No, dummy, I had completely forgot. Do you know how crazy that is? Do you know any friends that just had sex once and everything is still normal?”  
  
Yea, honestly, in comparison to the other friend he had sex with, that was pretty weird. “I dunno, maybe I just wasn’t on my A-game…”  
  
Komari snorted, “Hey, I already told you I was like ten percent disappointed it was interrupted. I haven’t wanted cock in a while.”  
  
“Just so damn special” Shin said, deadpan, “…Off the record, since we’re ‘normal’, I’ll admit you gave…pretty exceptional head.”  
  
“Aww, gee, thanks, bud. I had been self-conscious, I was super rusty with sucking a pipe.”  
  
Smirking, Shin shook his head as Komari yawned, curling into his side as she set her empty bottle aside. “…I love Kasumi. But she’s going to drive me crazy and I don’t think I should live like that. I guess you’re right. After this is over, we’ll…take a break.”  
  
Shin nodded softly. “…Either you’ll realize you’re better off without her or…distance will make the heart grow fonder.”  
  
…He guessed he was the latter.  
  


XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _“…I guess you’d be a cute couple.”  
  
Shin was eating lunch with his siblings the next day, his mom preparing sekihan rice and pickled daikon. He was sitting beside Komari in a corner so they wouldn’t be too near the open blinds of the window. Why anyone would be in the back of their house, he had no idea, but, well, he was guilty of that with her on several occasions.  
  
Komari had declared she had been the waitress at her dad’s establishment before she joined the military, performing the ceremonial tea preparation for some guests. The idea of Komari doing something so steeped in tradition and…calm cracked him up. She huffed and declared she’d show him. For whatever reason, they did have the chasen whisk and chashaku scoop along with the bowls and powdered tea. Komari did a confusingly good job and now they were partaking…  
  
While he had all intentions of moving them to a bed last night, he ended up dozing off with Komari again on the couch, snuggled up. Once, okay. Twice, his siblings were getting more and more suspicious and now his dear baby sister had declared this blasphemy. Shin blinked at her, the blonde young woman staring at them begrudgingly. “No. No, we would not.”  
  
“Maybe in another time and place but now? Nah” Komari agreed.  
  
Would they have been a good couple in another time and place? Well…they did kind of balance each other. He did literally make it two months alone in a desert with her. Nelly was yawning, the miscreant having been out with Koji until about four in the morning. “Well, not to be too…blatant, but Shin has mentioned you’re with someone.”  
  
Oops. Komari was unbothered, alas. “Oh yea, my girlfriend, Kasumi. We’re not on good terms right now though, so if you know any chicks or dudes that aren’t your brother, I may be on the rebound.”  
  
So special. Shaun apparently wasn’t a fan of green tea but was attempting to be polite, sipping it very gingerly. However, he looked up with this remark, his face startled. “Eh? Both?”  
  
“Yes, despite your brother’s lesbian preferences, I am bisexual” she smiled coyly, petting Shin’s hair.  
  
Shin choked on his tea, hacking as Nelly coughed to hide a laugh, the younger looking puzzled. Just SPECIAL. His dear lovely mother who was well within hearing distance came over with some plates and a smirk. Flustering and leering at Komari, he drawled, “I…have no idea what you’re talking about.”  
  
“Now you sound like dad” Nelly joked.  
  
“And how” Dana snorted, setting the bowl of rice on the table.  
  
What now? Komari giggled because she was crazy, declaring ‘itedakimasu’ as they dug in without delay, seemingly unbothered by her off the cuff declaration. Figures. Shaun was kind of quiet though. Hmm.  
  
Later on, when he got back from school, Shin gave Koji another night off, indicating that Komari could just stay in his room with him. Koji had smiled and said he was starting to understand Kasumi’s concerns. Bleh. “Really, I…I think I’m…”  
  
…Was he okay? Or was he just okay because Komari was here? He still had dreams but… “Well, I think I still want you HERE but maybe we’ve progressed past you sleeping in the same room as me.”  
  
Koji nodded, “That’s still progress though, Shin. I’m glad. And, seriously though? I know we discussed experiences changing people but you’ve been more like yourself since Komari got here. Or at least not so dejected. Sure she can’t move in until this is over?”  
  
“It’d be nice but I’m sure her dad will be here first thing in the morning…”_

 _“You have such a cool family.”  
  
Presently, Shin was pulling on his pajamas as Komari lied in his bed, flipping through his channels. He tilted his head at her remark. “Yea, we’re pretty laid back, I think.”  
  
“Ha, I thought us ‘country folk’ were but I am DREADING going back right now” she muttered, “Hopefully this is the last month. I’ve been watching the news but I haven’t heard them make any moves.”  
  
Shin had been…slightly. He struggled seeing all the turmoil over there. He wasn’t sure why though. No, not why in so much that he did care but ‘what about it’. A weird…perhaps emotional and crazy part of himself thought he needed to still be there helping. That’d be…a hell of a conversation to have with his family after all this. Crashing into his spot beside her, he murmured, “Mari…do you ever think about what to do after this?”  
  
“Like…?”  
  
“Like…never mind. I still have other roads to cross like apparently I get to meet your dad tomorrow and Kasumi has probably advised I’m the reason you’re missing a limb right now.”  
  
“Fuck-k-k that, Shin. I’ll just casually walk out and save you the misery” Komari snarled, “…I love my dad but it’s very easy for him to judge based off what has happened versus what really could have happened. I wouldn’t accept him badmouthing you.”  
  
He supposed… “Well, if he doesn’t lock you up, you’re always welcome back.”  
  
“Might take you up on that” she yawned softly before giving him a look, “Make sure you open your doors to another person too in the meantime.”  
  
Rolling his eyes, he sighed softly. Open his doors…  
  
_Shin wandered around his room, a little…listless. He guessed…he did need a distraction.  
  
Komari had been picked up around twelve the day before. As she said, she didn’t allow anyone to come out with her or see her off. Putting on her gray oversized sweats again, leaning on one crutch but standing pretty solidly, she had bowed to them. _“Thank you so much for your hospitality. And, really, don’t let your son tell you otherwise but I owe him my life.”  
_  
Again, hardly. His mom smiled, grasping her hands, _“As I said, I thank you for being there beside him and having his back. Please, whether it’s sneaking away or after this madness is over, you’re always welcome.”  
  
“Yes” _his dad had nodded _, “And take it easy on those legs. Make sure you don’t have any fluid retention in your limbs either.”  
  
“You’ve only been over that a bazillion times, dad” _Koji smirked _._

 _“Reinforcement never hurt”_ he groused _.  
  
_ Komari smiled _, “No, I appreciate It, truly.”  
  
_ She had tapped her fist to his, nodding once _, “…See you soon, Yagami. Either we’ll be decommissioned or resigned. Or, if it takes another two months, I’m moving in. One or the other.”  
  
_ Shin had chuckled some _, “Can’t wait.”  
  
_ Like, seriously, could not wait. He…he was lost in every direction he looked now. Gazing out of the window toward the front of the house, he noticed Shaun pull up on Kamex with another motorcycle riding beside him. Shaun turned to sit outward on Kamex as a young blond fellow dismounted the other bike, facing Shaun. They appeared to be chatting…ugh, he was messing it up for the kids, they couldn’t even have friends visit anymore.   
  
However, before he could get sucked into another depression and loathing warp, he stared as whomever mystery blond was leaned over and kissed Shaun pretty passionately. Oh.  
  
…Oh. Okay. That’s right, he had actually suspected that to some degree from his first return from deployment. Just…okay.  
  
Shin had to slowly walk away, walking to the left where Koji’s wing started. Coming to the broody fellow’s door, he found it open and his younger brother sitting at a desk, slumped over homework. Probably not a good time, but… “Uh…hey.”  
  
Koji looked up to him, his dark eyes half-closed, and said nothing. Oh no, temper mode. “Um, just…quick question, I won’t bother you. Just…while I was away or MIA, did…certain siblings of ours perhaps…define some suspicions we may have had about them and clarified so I don’t reveal anything too interpersonal that they haven’t admitted to the family?”  
  
“…What the hell are you talking about?” Koji questioned, wide-eyed and bewildered.  
  
Yea, that was confusing. “Never mind. It doesn’t matter, I just…didn’t want to have missed something that might be important to them.”  
  
Koji leaned back, grabbing a bottle of water he had seated on the corner of the desk, before his brows suddenly quirked. “ _Oh-h-h_ , I see.”  
  
Hmm? Shaking his head to the negative, Koji took a drink and sighed, rasping, “Nah, he hasn’t exactly told us anything but I have seen the person in question. I’m not sure it’s a…strict attraction.”  
  
Now it was Shin’s turn to be confused. “What…?”  
  
“I’ve definitely seen _way_ more than I want to but I…don’t get the idea he’s just going in that one direction which may be why he doesn’t feel need to mention it” Koji shrugged.   
  
Leaning against the door jamb, Shin’s brows furrowed, “…You know, _we_ said we’d be okay with it but…honestly, I don’t know what dad or mom would think about it?”  
  
“Mom definitely wouldn’t have a problem…dad, I can’t see him being cruel but I can’t say I know his…biases” Koji drawled.  
  
While Shin would _hope_ his father didn’t have such ‘biases’, he could definitely see some constructs from Wasaba not making that the easiest conversation. Biting his lip, Shin murmured, “Should…should we reiterate that _we_ have his back or…?”  
  
“Or. He’s our baby brother who might be a little more fluid with his relationship options than we are” Koji shrugged again. “If he needs us to double down on that, of course, but having his back is there in all regards as long as it’s not something stupid.”  
  
…Yes. “Um…any…of the other kids…?”  
  
“Jill’s got a boyfriend, I’m pretty sure, just haven’t been able to catch the punk” the brunette scoffed, “I guess that’s the downfall of our protective streak: she’s hella secretive. I don’t like it one bit but I’d rather know who the fucker is so I can go pop him a new one if he gives her problems. I already handled one _non_ romantic incident she completely failed to tell anyone about that would only piss you off so I’ll spare you.”  
  
Ugh. “Fine. And…Tony isn’t out two-timing anymore?”  
  
“He is definitely of the polyamorous sort so he isn’t hooking up with girls looking for boyfriends. Seems like he’s grown up a lot because of you going missing.”  
  
…Great. Shin leaned his head back, staring up, before smiling some. “…I’m still missing. Something.”  
  
“Something, huh?”  
  
Yes. “Life. Existence. Time…” he murmured, “…Maybe…maybe her.”  
  
Without remarking on that, Koji started to write again before he paused…then sighed. “…It is not the sound your soul needs right now.”  
  
“What?”  
  
Koji leaned back, rubbing his brow, before he groaned and opened up a drawer. Shin was surprised when he pulled out a CD and handed it to him. What?   
  
It was crazy but, he supposed it was the most nostalgic of feelings, his heart skipped a beat. “Is-Is this _new_ Nirvana?”  
  
“Mm.”  
  
No _way_. Shin stared at the CD, apparently a single, his pulse racing. “Oh-Oh my God, they went on without Kurt? Or-Or got together to do a new album?”  
  
“No. It’s from when Kurt was alive. His wife waited to release it now.”  
  
… _Eight years later_? “It’s just one song” Koji explained before shooting him a look, “…Don’t get addicted. Like I said, it’s probably not good for you right now.”  
  
New _Nirvana_ , his favorite band _ever_? He had wanted _something_ to seal him back into what he once used to know or the good stuff! Shaking his head, Shin huffed and headed back to his room, “Maybe I’ll consult with you later over my findings.”  
  
Koji chuckled. “Sure.”  
  
Excited wasn’t even the word. _New Nirvana_. He hadn’t even thought. Going to get his CD player, he eagerly sat on the bed and popped the disc into the tray, pressing ‘play’. Folding his hands, finding himself smiling, he waited for _something_ new but at least familiar.  
  
 _I will never bother you. I will never promise to. I will never follow you. I will never bother you. Never say a word again, I will crawl away for good. I will move away from here; You won’t be afraid to fear. No thought was put into this, I always knew it would come to this.  
  
Things have never been so swell and I have never failed to fail.  
  
Pain. Pain. Pain…you know you’re right. You know you’re right. You know you’re right.  
  
It’s so warm and calm inside. I no longer have to hide. There’s talk about someone else. Sterling silver begins to melt. Nothin’ really bothers her; She just wants to love herself. I will move away from here; you won’t be afraid to fear. No thought was put into this, I always knew it’d come to this. _

_Things have never been so swell and I have never failed to fail._  
  
 _Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. You know you’re right…you know, you’re right. You know, you’re right. You know you’re right. Y_ _ou know you're right. You know you're right. You know you're right. You know you're right. You know you're right. You know you're right. You know you're right. You know you're right. You know your rights. You know you're right. You know your rights. You know your rights. You know your rights. Pain…_  
  
Shin stared. Oh. Right.

Nostalgia…for another human being having something very muddled in their life that they weren’t able to resolve before it was too late or they could find other answers. Shin stared into the distance at that purple aura that never left, trembling. _No thought was put into this, I always knew it’d come to this._

Better to burn out than to fade away…smiling, Shin lied down in bed under his covers and played it on repeat a few times. Nostalgia…and something new.  
  
…He finally understood Kurt.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

 _“What the fuck did I say? Gimme that. Listen to some fucking Coldplay.”  
  
_ Shin wandered around his family’s backyard, wearing a dark hoodie as his camouflage. It was about two in the morning. Keiba had called Koji and asked to take him out with their roommate, Domon, apparently thinking their friend was in the dumps. Koji had come to inform him and found him probably on his hundredth play through of “You Know, You’re Right”. His little brother confiscated Nirvana and replaced it with A Rush of Blood to the Head.   
  
Okay, so, he begrudgingly listened to it…and as far as alternative pop went, it was…new. Not his favorite. He didn’t hate it but he kind of hated Koji right now for taking Nirvana away for it. Annoyed, Shin decided to get some fresh air.

It’d been about three days since Komari went away. He had a nightmare last night that he was drowning in sand, suffocating, and surrounded with the dead bodies and vehicles he buried. Thus, his…calm was a fluke and he was still a mental disaster.  
  
Gazing ahead, he saw the violet waves pulling him toward the little jungle of his childhood. It was more and more overgrown now as the traffic diminished but there was still an opening in the middle, where he had run after his fight with Koji. While he was prepared to ignore it again, he glanced over his shoulder. No one was home. His mom very reluctantly had to go handle something at a new shop she had just built and he insisted she go. He appreciated her promises….but someone had to live their life since it couldn’t be him.  
  
…He…never thought it’d come to this. He felt so numb. Even listening to his favorite group felt hollow in parts. Komari being here had been the most complete he’d felt in a long time. What…was he really _missing_? He walked into the fade again.

Shin froze. Sitting curled up on the ground in their hollow, hugging her knees, was Okamoto Lyla.  
  
…His beautiful fairy angel always took his breath away. The monster showed up this time.  
  
Holding his breath, he turned away. It…wasn’t his favorite sound nor did he dislike it, but it stuck in his head and he…listened to it a few times.

_A warning sign. I missed the good part then I realized. I started looking and the bubble burst. I started looking for excuses. Come on in. I’ve got to tell you what a state I’m in._ _I've gotta tell you in my loudest tones that I started looking for a warning sign._

_When the truth is, I miss you. Yeah, the truth is that I miss you so…  
  
_

_A warning sign. It came back to haunt me, and I realized that you were an island and I passed you by when you were an island to discover…Come on in. I've gotta tell you what a state I'm in. I've gotta tell you in my loudest tones that I started looking for a warning sign…  
  
_

_When the truth is, I miss you. Yeah, the truth is that I miss you so…_

_  
_“Koji…? Is that you?”  
  
God…God, he…he hadn’t heard her voice in over two years.  
  


_And I'm tired…I should not have let you go.  
  
_

Truly trembling, he tried to walk away. She wouldn’t understand who he was now. He didn’t understand. Keeping his back to her, he…remained silent. What…what was there to say…? _  
_  
“Are…are you okay? You usually don’t come back here…”  
  
Shin clenched his eyes shut as he felt her presence right behind him. God, what…what was this?   
  
_So, I crawl back into your open arms_

_Yes, I crawl back into your open arms  
And I crawl back into your open arms  
Yes, I crawl back into your open arms_

  
“Koji--”   
  
Shin breathed as her fingers slid against his palm, curling around his hand where his pulse thundered like a drum. It…felt like home. A home he wasn’t welcome in any longer.  
  
She was quiet, just grasping his hand as he didn’t have the guts to even grip hers back. What did he do? Pretend to be Koji and play it off? He…he could.  
  
Instead, everything around him just got dull as she very slowly walked around to face him. Her eyes looked tired now and her skin seemed phantom pale in the moonlight. She stared at him, the green eyes he loved even as a child unyielding.  
  
“…Shin?” she barely said.  
  
…God, he missed her so. “…Hey, Lai.”  
  
They stood in silence for a moment before Lyla shakily lifted her hands, pressing them to his cheeks. His scratches and burns had faded but scars still remained. Even his eyes were a darker shade of blue nowadays. Was this Shin? He reached up and grasped her small hand in his finally, closing his eyes. He…he wanted to be.  
  
“I-I don’t--”  
  
Opening his eyes to look at her, he stiffened, shocked to find her face scrunched up in agony. “I-I don’t—I don’t un-under—I don’t--!”

  
Oh no. Shin yelped as she started to hyperventilate, her hands gripping her chest as she fell to her knees. Oh no. “L-Lai, c-calm down--”  
  
In the distance, he heard a light ‘Lyla?’. _Oh no_. Also panicking, he quickly picked her up into his arms and crouched, stealthily checking the open back yard between their houses. Whomever had called wasn’t visible…so he _bolted_ for the deck door and quietly closed it behind them.  
  
His heart broke as Lyla sobbed wretchedly, her arms wrapped around his neck. “Is this real? Is this real?”  
  
He shyly hugged her waist as she wailed, “They kept saying you were missing a-and _dead_. They _kept saying you were dead_!! Why did they keep _saying that_?!”  
  
Shin grimaced as she almost had another panic attack, pulling her even closer and pressing his lips to her temple. “Lai--”  
  
“A-All I could think w-was how you must’ve been-been _suffering and-and_ I-I couldn’t believe yo-you were gone an-and the-the last time we even spoke, I left you _hating me_ and I-I couldn’t accept it, but--!”  
  
She was choking and gagging. Damn. Damn it. Shaking his head, he eased them to the floor, holding her as she just cried. “…I know the article said I went down in the water. I didn’t. Our plane was shot down over the desert by the Zechs. Our…our tracking system was destroyed so I…I and a friend ended up wandering the desert for two months until we were found. Just…while I was out there, I found some concentration camps and-and the army wanted to utilize the information without revealing how it was attained. They sent us home and forced us to have everyone around us keep it secret. Thus, I’ve…I’ve not been able to tell anyone aside from my family I’m alive for months now. I’m…I’m so sorry, Lyla. I’m so sorry. I don’t hate you. I…I never hated you.”  
  
Her completely red eyes stared at him miserably. Man, now she had a reason to hate him. Shin stared, startled, as she gingerly reached out to pet his hair. “…Is this really real?”  
  
“…Yes.”  
  
“Are you sure?”  
  
“…I think so.”  
  
Shakily sitting up on her haunches, she took a deep breath, rubbing her eyes as tears still fell. God, he felt awful. “Lai, I-I did mean to…to come to you, really. I thought…thought about you a whole lot while I was deployed and in the desert especially. I just…”  
  
…Have issues. Not able to articulate the depth of his predicament, he looked down instead. Like he thought, he was intimidated by the mere concept of letting her down.   
  
Lyla grasped his hand, resting it against her cheek. What? He stared as she tenderly kissed his palm, the skin of which spent days soaked in blood of people not too long ago. She didn’t…understand. She wouldn’t understand. He didn’t…want her to.  
  
Shin breathed as she leaned in and kissed his lips sweetly. Oh.  
  
He closed his eyes as she kissed the corner of his mouth, returning to caress his lips with hers. He’d…been with several other women since he’d been with her. He…never felt…even close…  
  
Embracing her, he returned the affections tenfold, pressing his lips to her jaw and cheek, kissing her devotedly, his heart racing,

Shin felt it and it scared him: _something_ was okay now.  
  
…Ugh. “Lai…they’ll…they’ll come looking for you” he whispered between kisses, “I…I can’t get…found out, it’s too…too risky.”  
  
His childhood best friend pulled away, looking at him solemnly. “…You’re sending me away?”  
  
“I don’t _want_ to” he insisted, shaking his head, “But…we both know your dad wouldn’t exactly respect my mission right now if it got back to him, Lyla. I…I want you to stay, really, it’s just…just too dangerous to what I need accomplished.”  
  


“…All right.”  
  
Lyla got to her feet, dusting off her skirt. He stood as well, a knot in his throat as he walked her to the front door. She quietly shut it behind her, not saying another word.  
  
Looking at the barrier he wasn’t allowed to cross right now, Shin finally smiled. Well…time to take some drugs to sleep. Maybe even take a few shots for good measure too, huh? Something left.  
  
He walked around the house in circles for about thirty minutes with a glass of whiskey in his hand, sipping it gingerly before rinsing the cup and setting it in the sink. His mind was racing but it kept hitting a brick wall…or sand. Just a hell of a lot of sand.  
  
With that, he headed for the stairs, getting up about…three when there was a faint knock at the door. Shin paused, alarmed. Oh crap, who was visiting at three in the morning?!  
  
Turning to stare, however, he…felt that certain…something again. What?  
  
…Against all good sense and the fact that this would be a helluva time to blow his cover, he walked back down the steps and peered into the peephole. Why he was surprised, even he couldn’t say at any point, but he was shocked to see Lyla. Did…she change her mind?  
  
Shin opened the door and she quickly entered…with a gigantic suitcase.  
  
“…Um, Lyla?”  
  
“Sorry, I had to wait until the maid fell asleep” she explained softly.  
  
… “…Lyla, I…I don’t think you understand” he said, honestly a tad flabbergasted.  
  
The pink-haired woman blinked at him. “You said you wanted me to stay, Yagami Shin. I want to stay as well.”  
  
God, he hadn’t heard the way she said his name like that in forever. Kind of…melting, he rapidly shook his head to harden up. “Lyla, your mom and dad will look for you. They’ll track you over here. I-I promise, it won’t be much longer and then I—I swear to you, Lyla, we will catch up and-and everything, okay?”  
  
“So you don’t want me here.”  
  
“Of course I _want_ you here, Lai!” he protested in exasperation, “It’s just--”  
  
He inhaled when she kissed him lovingly. Lovingly. It felt _loving_ and his resolve pretty much _evaporated_. Somewhere in his mind he heard a fiddle playing. Sealing this battle he apparently didn’t have the skill to resolve, she stared at him pleadingly, “I promise you, Shin, I won’t mess this up. But I can’t be without you again. Not again.”  
  
…A rush of blood to the head indeed.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 **End Notes:  
**  
The song when Shin, Koji, and Nelly were in the car, trying to garner up the nerve to approach Lyla was Iris by the Goo Goo Dolls. I dunno, the 90s was weird.  
  
You Know You’re Right was released like…eight years posthumously after Kurt Cobain killed himself. Which I wasn’t actually aware of until I wrote this and explains to me why it was played so much in the early 2000s.  
  
Koji gives Shin A Rush of Blood to the Head which was released by Coldplay in like, 2002. It’s calmer music, sure, but I don’t know if it’s less…emotional. Warning Sign is a track off the album.


	17. Siren

**Chapter 17:** Siren

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

 _“…Um, what…exactly…happened in the almost approximately five hours I’ve been gone?”  
  
Shin smiled widely, his eyes pinned open as he stared at the ceiling of his bedroom at almost 5:30 in the morning. Nothing off in that but what was very extremely off was Okamoto Lyla lying beside him in said bed, fast asleep. “…Mistakes. Mistakes have been made.”_  
  
 _Yagami Koji had probably come to check on him before he went to bed but also seemed a little alarmed about this sudden change of events. “Where did she even come from??”  
  
“It’s…a very long story.”  
  
“From five hours ago??”  
  
Squeezing the bridge of his nose, all Shin could do was shake his head. Koji raised a brow. “…You want me to set my bed back up in here?”  
  
“No…” Shin mumbled, “I…haven’t explained anything about anything to her yet except the basic premise of what happened. I’ll tell her tomorrow but I’m probably not going to sleep much anyway.”  
  
“Well…maybe for safety’s sake, you should take one of those tranqs Matsushima sent.”  
  
Right. Because if he were to just accidentally doze off with her beside him, he was not able to measure what he was capable of doing to her. He ought to wake her up right now and explain she was now lying in bed with the monster they used to run from in make believe.  
  
Lyla sighed softly, curling deeper into his side, murmuring his name. Staring at her, he awkwardly grabbed the bottle with one hand, spinning off the cap and clumsily taking out a pill. “…Night, Koji.”  
  
“Night, Shin.”  
  
…Not yet.  
_  
“—okay? I don’t remember him sleeping like this.”  
  
“He’s fine, Lyla.”  
  
What?  
  
Shin opened his eyes, groggy as hell. He was lying in bed on his back. Oh hell, those pills put him out _hard_. Rubbing his face, he lifted his head a bit to find Koji and Lyla speaking in the doorway. Glancing at the alarm clock, he grimaced. Yea, 3 pm was a little late there. He sat up and rubbed his face, mumbling, “Good afternoon.”  
  
“Oh, hey” Koji greeted.  
  
He smiled quickly when Lyla rushed to him, her eyes full of concern, “Are you okay? You were sleeping like-like…”  
  
He was dead. “A-Ah, yea, I…I sleep a bit differently now, Lyla.”  
  
Understatement of the Year. Koji cleared his throat, “I’m going to go get some groceries. Did you guys need anything?”  
  
“Oh, no, I’m good, thanks” Shin replied.  
  
Lyla shook her head and Koji sent him a bit of a look. Meh, he was fine _awake_. Somewhat. Shin just nodded once and Koji left. Lyla looked at him, tilting her head. He guessed he looked different in sunlight. She…she looked gorgeous, he probably looked insane.  
  
She smiled. Eh? “You look different with long hair.”  
  
Oh, right. “Ha, yea, I, uh…haven’t gotten around to cutting it yet and, um, well…I didn’t…want anyone else to. It helps if…if I do get caught.”  
  
Lies. “I understand. I like it” Lyla murmured, pushing a loose lock behind his ear.  
  
Oh. His heart was skipping as she gazed into his eyes. Oh man, this was crazy, he…he felt all…warm and fuzzy or something. She sat up, her eyes…melancholy, “…You won’t tell me, will you?”  
  
“What…?”  
  
“What you’ve been through.”  
  
… “Maybe…maybe in time, Lyla, it’s…it’s a lot” he whispered. “What…what about you? What…what have you been up to?”  
  
She made a face, shrugging, “…Nothing, really. I was going to school up until yesterday.”  
  
What? “Yesterday? You’re going back, right?”  
  
Shaking her head to the negative, he…got a real bad feeling. “Lyla, please, don’t…don’t drop out just because you want to be here. I mean, it was a load of BS anyway, but you’re pretty much done.”  
  
“Oh no, I didn’t drop out. I completed it yesterday” she explained, “It’s not a degree or even a certification. They just determined I’d be ‘apt’ at being a wife and gave me some piece of paper saying I was trained.”  
  
God, he forgot how irritating things in her life were. Trained to be a wife, what the hell? “Well, I’m…glad you’re done with that. I guess that just means your dad is going to be…hunting harder now for a husband.”  
  
Lyla looked off for a moment before shrugging. Oh, okay. His eyes closed some, drawling, “…Guess we’re both keeping stuff in this time.”  
  
With a pout, she turned back to him. “…He doesn’t even really talk to me anymore. So I don’t know what he’s got planned, I can only assume at this point.”  
  
Shin’s brows furrowed, “What do you mean he doesn’t talk to you? You’ve done everything he asked.”  
  
Well…almost everything given she was sitting here right now. Lyla hugged her legs, resting her chin on her knees before murmuring, “…When I heard you were classified as ‘dead’, I rushed home and screamed at him. I told him…it was all his fault I hadn’t been able to see you in years even though I had to shoulder most of the blame. You have every right to be upset with me but…you can’t know how it felt to have been sitting here thinking that was our last interaction.”  
  
… “No, I…definitely know the feeling.”  
  
She stood up, squeezing his hand, “Dana is resting so I’ll make you some lunch, okay?”  
  
“O-Oh, you don’t have to--”  
  
Lyla kissed him sweetly, shaking her head, “…I haven’t gotten to cook for you in forever either. I want to…to make up for all the lost time.”  
  
She left while he just melted into his bed. Resting his face in his hands, he groaned softly. God, he wasn’t going to make it this way, she was so damn cute. Finally standing up, he yawned and stretched, rubbing his face. Well…she told him a little bit but she hadn’t…told him _why_ she didn’t say anything.  
  
Wandering to the shower, he miserably shook his head. Unfortunately, as he said…she wasn’t the only one not willing to share secrets right now.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
“…Oh my God.”  
  
Day…3. Again, counting days but this time it was with Okamoto Lyla. And the days? The days…were everything.  
  
They were lying in his bed, a good a place as any, and she’d invited him to rest his head in her lap. He shyly conceded before he had a complete revelation. Telling her he’d be right back, he rushed to Koji’s room where he was studying and requested to have the Nirvana CD back. Koji stared at him drably before handing it over, not saying a word. Shin probably had a stupid expression on his face of joy.   
  
…Koji knew it hadn’t been the same without her.  
  
Returning to the room, hooking up his CD player, he resumed his spot in her lap and updated her. She was initially excited…but, if there was one downer in this miracle, it was the song itself. Lyla looked…dismayed. “…He…he really _was_ depressed.”  
  
“Yea” Shin murmured.  
  
“I hope his daughter is doing all right. Her father was famous so she’ll never escape what happened to him…not that she could or should, just…”  
  
Shin’s brows quirked in agreement as she sighed, leaning back on her palms, “…Can’t say it’s my _favorite_ Nirvana. It’s just a little _too_ on the nose with what we already know happened.”  
  
Unfortunately, he couldn’t say he felt it deep in his soul to the point it ached. Which led to how nighttime was a _nightmare_.

“I don’t understand.”  
  
He groaned, having spaced himself across the entirety of his bed to take pills to put him entirely under. While he meant to keep it a secret from Lyla, well, it was kind of hard to do when he didn’t, oh, put the pills away and dozed off with the bottle in his hands. Better yet, the pills just tumbled out of the container all over the mattress so she’d nicely put them away only to see he was taking a tranquilizer. That was day 2.  
  
“Lyla--”  
  
“I don’t remember you having trouble sleeping before.”  
  
He wished she’d…not say that. Pinching the bridge of his nose, he shook his head. “…No, Lyla, I did not have trouble sleeping when we parted ways two years ago. It is a fresh development, one I don’t wish to speak on.”  
  
She was brushing her hair, staring at him pensively. She probably also wasn’t used to him being this short with her either. Just…this once, he had no intention of just bending to her. Not on this.  
  
Turning the light out on his side, he got under the covers to let the drug take effect. Nope, she wasn’t done. “You won’t let me touch you either.”  
  
“Lyla.”  
  
“Shin, I just want to understand. I want to understand you.”  
  
“And _I_ don’t want you to.”  
  
Silence. Just a long, dead, silence. If he looked at her though, he’d crack and make something superfluous up because, end of the day, he…he didn’t want her to understand him. No. There would be no understanding, he just…didn’t want her to know these parts of him.  
  
There was a rustling before he heard steps across the floor. Eh? Finally looking up, he was startled when she had just…straight up left the bedroom. Oh.  
  
After ten minutes, the drugs were starting to kick in and Lyla wasn’t back. He was blacking out and _panicking._ No, come…come _back_. You wouldn’t understand. You _can’t…_

…Could it…really not be the same anymore?  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _They were in the desert again, this time…he was entirely by himself.  
  
The sheer…miracle it took that Komari and he lived during that journey was…impossible. The more and more he dwelled on it, he was just aghast. He pulled up a map and just looked at it, where they started and where they were rescued. They crossed that many miles…in enemy territory. Yes, there were cars and yes there were circumstances, but none of that should have possibly meant they made it. To do it ALONE though? No, that was truly and absolutely impossible.  
  
But, in this dream, he did it. He ran into all the same people, lived all the same experiences. He strangled someone, he cut someone’s throat, he blew out dozens of brains—he went crazy, he was starving, he was dying of thirst. All of it, just…no Komari.  
  
When he finally reached the climax of his harrowing adventure, however, he found Lyla standing there instead of the Zechs. She was gazing at him solemnly, her hands crossed before her. Shin just stared back. He lived it again. Didn’t have much of a choice, his body could not physically wake up right now, he was basically under anesthesia except he was dreaming. There hadn’t been dreams before. Now, he HAD to live it.  
  
He could never tell her ANY of that.  
  
“See?”  
  
Shin stiffened, glancing to his side. Okamoto Bajiru was sitting at that desk where he berated Shin for his race and his family. Just sitting there, right out in the desert, with a smirk. “I told you you weren’t good enough for her.”  
  
…Fuck.  
  
Opening his eyes, the gates opening to let him out of that forced terror, Shin stared at the ceiling of his bedroom in the milky light streaming through the windows. It was raining outside. He…hadn’t heard rain in a long time.  
  
He took a long deep breath before looking to his side, expecting a vacant void of space. Bajiru was right. He didn’t deserve her.   
  
Lyla was curled up on her side under the covers, the mid-Autumn air brisk in the room. Shin stared at the back of her head and felt his eyes burn. He didn’t deserve her at all.  
  
Pulling himself across the space, he softly curled into her back, closing his eyes to not sleep but to give what little he could. Once upon a time, he could fall asleep wrapped around her. He would be thankful to do that again, just...he wasn’t so sure it would be granted to him._

 _He…he didn’t want her father to be right.  
  
_ “You don’t want to tell her _anything_?”  
  
Shin leaned against the wall as Koji hung out the window in his room, smoking a cigarette. Lyla was taking a bath but hadn’t said much of anything to him when she woke up. Yea, she came back, didn’t mean she wasn’t _pissed_.   
  
“…I just—I just _can’t_ , Koji.”  
  
“What are you afraid of?”  
  
“…Judgment? I don’t know” he scowled, mumbling, “I guess I don’t want to look like a fucking monster and failure in her eyes.”  
  
Koji rolled his eyes, tapping the ashes, “You are _far_ from both. Have you been looking at the news at all?”  
  
What? “Not as of late…”  
  
“They started the round up yesterday of the Terran.”  
  
… _What_? “W-What? Why didn’t you tell me?!”  
  
And why in the _fuck_ had it taken so long?! Most of those people—they had to have been dead! He gritted his teeth, rushing downstairs to the computer. Yes, there were strategies and manpower and training to resolve but it had been _two months_.   
  
Once connected, he swallowed as he looked at the latest news about the Earthmates. Sure enough, there was an article indicating that their military had entered the desert territory Shin and Komari had crossed ‘in an effort to recover kidnapped Terrans’. Shin scanned the page.   
  
…Huh. No wonder Koji didn’t tell him, they hadn’t _said_ jackshit. Now all he could do was sit here and hope they’d found _anyone_ alive. Gulping, the lump getting lodged in his throat, he shut his eyes tight. If…if _that_ were for nothing…  
  
“…Shin.”  
  
He jumped a bit and cursed himself hard when his hand still mindlessly went to his pocket for a weapon that wasn’t there. Damn it, he…he was a disaster. He was just simply a disaster. Turning the desk chair to Lyla, he forced a smile, “A-Ah, hey, Lyla.”  
  
The pink-haired woman blinked at him as he stood. Just like the dream, she folded her hands before her. She was wearing this…long, almost frumpy, gray gown. It reminded him of her mother. “…I wanted to apologize for the way I acted last night. It was very immature and I shouldn’t argue with you.”  
  
What? Shin probably had a weird look on his face because why was she even talking to him like this? “What are you talking about?”  
  
“Last night, I left the room on emotion and I shouldn’t have. I apologize.”  
  
Why was he getting angry? Was he really this broken in the mind to get angry that she was apologizing? About to request she stop because he was insane, he stared at her…and had irritating clarity.  
  
“Stop it.”  
  
Lyla looked at him absently as he glared. “Stop it. I don’t know what the fuck goes on over there but you’re not apologizing to me out of submission here. I was being an asshole and you got upset because I was being an asshole. That is fine and don’t bring that ‘wifely’ nonsense here where you just have to take my bullshit and bottle it up because I’m the husband. My wife doesn’t need to submit to me.”  
  
Wait, wait, _wouldn’t,_ not _doesn’t_. Flustering as she looked very startled, he stammered, “T-That is, my-my wife wouldn’t. She _wouldn’t_.”  
  
Her eyes softened as he felt his face grow hotter. That whole sentence was a disaster too. Like…like he could…could ever deserve to have her as his wife. She got closer and embraced him, kissing him sweetly. God, if she just…knew, she wouldn’t kiss him like that.  
  
“Baka.”  
  
“I am…” he droned, holding her waist with one arm.  
  
“You had to kill people, right?”  
  
…Oh. Shin stared down at her as she looked back. It was such a…passive look in her eyes, it actually made him shiver. Did she understand what she just asked him? She…she couldn’t possibly…  
  
“Remember when you told us you were joining the military? Your baby brother asked that, he asked if you were going to end up killing people. Your baby sister was concerned you were going to be killed. Since you don’t want me to bottle things up, I want you to understand that not one person in your family, young or old, misunderstood what you’d be getting into. You were going to war and it wasn’t a war where you’re trying to only target one person or monitor a circumstance. You were fighting an active enemy in combat so they wouldn’t kill you. Do you think I didn’t understand what that meant?”  
  
…Shit. Gaping at her wordlessly as she looked back, unyielding, she shook her head. “I know what you think of me, Yagami Shin: You think I’m a hippy incapable of understanding violence and war. You think I didn’t look to see if they’d exhausted all their resources to stop these people before it came to bloodshed and thought I’d be against it regardless. If no other way had been attempted, I would have spoken my mind because that is what you’ve allowed me to do our whole relationship. There was no other way so I stood behind you…but not…not once did I think you were going to come out of this without blood on your hands.”  
  
Oh God. He covered his face, taking a hard breath. It didn’t feel good to have her understanding. At all. She just… “I…” he rasped, his voice breaking, “I did…such God awful things, Lai, you don’t understand. I did _terrible_ things…”  
  
“Did you torture or did you try to make their deaths quick and easy?”  
  
… “I…I tried to end it quickly, but--”  
  
“If I know anything you _didn’t_ do, I know you didn’t rape or assault anyone as a tactic or for your entertainment. I know you didn’t kill if there was another way” Lyla shook her head, “…You’ll never not be perfect in my eyes, Shin. For me that doesn’t mean flawless but that, whatever it is you do, you’re not doing it senselessly. You’ve…you’ve always wanted to do the right thing.”  
  
She didn’t know what she was _talking about_. Pulling away, clenching his head, he spat, “And if I told you I strangled someone?”  
  
“Why?”  
  
“Because I had to kill him!”  
  
Lyla shook her head, “Strangling is very intimate. You’d have to form your hands around someone’s throat and additionally keep them pinned in order for them not to disengage you. It would be a senseless expenditure of energy.”  
  
Woah now. Shin looked at her, slowly digesting that…very blunt analysis. “…I…I didn’t have any guns or ammo near me.”  
  
She _nodded_. What the fuck! “And if-if I told you I cut someone’s throat, huh? I had a gun on me then, how do you justify that?”  
  
“Why didn’t you use the gun?”  
  
Aggravated beyond belief, he snapped, “I-It would have given away our cover. I cut his throat because it was the silent way for him to die. That doesn’t make it _right_!!”  
  
He sat down at the chair, taking hard breaths to try to calm himself down. How’d he go from never telling her any of this to telling her almost every little thing? She approached his side, apparently already aware he was nuts and not to approach him from behind despite being the only other person in this room. She _couldn’t_ be okay with this. _He_ wasn’t okay with this.  
  
“You’re angry with yourself. You gave your own reasons and every one of them were practical for that circumstance. Maybe you were ashamed to tell me but you’re really more ashamed of yourself. You can’t reason with your experience because you were dealing with maliciousness and impracticality. You had to use practical means to kill people that were malicious, evil, and impractical. For a person like you, that disturbs your being. But that’s you. Don’t project your unforgiveness of yourself back on me.”  
  
Shin stared into the distance and slowly shut his eyes. Sighing, miserable, he nodded, “…You’re right. I’m sorry, Lyla.”  
  
“No” she murmured, hugging his shoulders, “…I’ve also placed myself in the position that it looks like I would judge you for things, like I…I would judge you for something of that nature that’s out of your control. I broke that trust.”  
  
…Mm. She kissed his temple, tenderly whispering ‘I love you’. His fairy angel, he smiled grimly, grasping her hand and pressing the back of it to his cheek. “I love you too.”  
  
“Enough that you’ll tell me why you can’t sleep?”  
  
He rolled his eyes, groaning. This woman. “…Look, I am on board with all you’re saying but it might take me a minute to feel comfortable telling you that. You _may_ judge me on that circumstance. However, I…I should have told you from day one, it’s…it’s probably not safe for you to sleep with me.”  
  
Again, she _shrugged_. “Lyla…I really, really want you to start respecting your life more, okay? I’m advising it’s not _safe_. I had Koji sleeping in the room with me for _months_ and-and, well…”  
  
“Something happened” she nodded, “Dana advised me not to wake you if you were tossing and turning.”  
  
Great. “I know you, Shin, no matter how much battle-weariness you’ve gained: you’d never intentionally hurt your mother and I know you’d never intentionally hurt me. If it helps you rest and feel calm, do what you have to, just…be careful. I don’t want anything to happen to you because of that medication.”  
  
…Right. Kissing him again, she smiled. “I’m going to go help Dana with brunch and then we can watch a movie?”  
  
“Sure.”  
  
Rubbing his head, a tumultuous headache brewing inside of his skull, he glanced back at the news page still up on the internet. Two months later.  
  
…Lyla was right. She was incredibly right…  
  
He…he couldn’t forgive himself.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _Oh no_.

_Shin probably needed to put up a mural on his ceiling as much as he was currently looking at it at all times of the day. Tonight? Well, he realized he’d…slept dreamlessly with Komari for a few days and, even a few days after she left, he was okay. Thus, he…tried it and found that he wasn’t having them frequently. That was the problem though, he wasn’t sure when they were going to come. His plan now was to train himself to sleep lightly so if he did go into the dream, he could wake up and take something.  
  
Of course, there was one…minor flaw to his plan.  
  
Being that the pill put him into a near fugue-like state and coma, everything going on around him was null and void. There was a…strong chance he had missed it in the week she’d been here.   
  
He swallowed hard as she whimpered, the sheets jostling a bit with her movement. After a few minutes, he heard that little…squelch and covered his face. Oh, hell.  
  
She was moaning softly now, the sounds of her fingers sinking into her sex growing more and more audible. His mind had been going into so many different territories he forgot he could get an erection from external stimuli.   
  
Exhaling, he rapidly shook his head. No, no, no, he could not jerk off with her right beside him because she was sleep masturbating. Just…meditate. She’d be done soon.  
  
Oh fuck, that shake, he trembled, when her legs briefly tremored, a satisfied breath escaping her as she apparently returned to her usual slumber. Giving himself a few passive strokes, he turned on his side and…popped a pill to go to sleep. It seemed…highly inappropriate to think about sex right now. Really, he hadn’t thought about it much AT ALL but…  
  
…He guessed he definitely had gotten her back in his life completely, huh?_

“Um, the hell? Fuck her.”  
  
Shin leered as they sat in Koji’s room, the door closed. He had never been invited to any of their ‘hotboxes’ and he hadn’t wanted to this time either. Alas, Lyla and Jill were having girly chat time or something so he figured he’d catch up with the miscreant twins. There was a brief break at their universities so Nelly was home for once on a Thursday, both smoking pot and filling this _gigantic_ room with weed smoke.  
  
Closing his eyes, dozing off because weed made him sleepy, he mumbled, “I just…I can’t just _fuck_ her, Nelly.”  
  
“Look at this lightweight, falling asleep” teased Nelly, exhaling more smoke.  
  
Koji snickered, lying on his side, “Seriously, you’ve been smoking weed for two months now.”  
  
With a snort, he took a mild puff, “And I will be ending that very soon because this is _still_ illegal.”  
  
“Oh, look: there goes Mr. Officer-san again” Koji said dryly.  
  
Hmm. His PTSD was probably way too strong for him to be an effective cop. He didn’t want to be either lax and negligent or a trigger finger. “I dunno what I’mma do after all this is over…”  
  
The broodier of the duo scoffed, leaning back, “Dummy. You know you’re going back into the military.”  
  
“I beg the _fuck your pardon_?” Nelly said, his eyes wide.  
  
Shin pursed his lips, gazing off as Nelly sat up straight. “Are you _fucking kidding me_? What the _fuck_? I know we’re not spiritual, fucker, but _something_ in this _universe_ let you live. And it sure as fuck didn’t let you live to go _test fate_ again!!”  
  
“Nerimaru, I don’t know what let me live. It certainly was a miracle. Anyway, they probably won’t let me back, my brain is fried.”  
  
“Meaning you _would_ go back if they offered it” Nelly snarled.  
  
“Gotta give him credit, Nell: it takes a badass to get through a fucking desert full of enemies in real life” Koji yawned.  
  
Rubbing his eyes, Nelly drawled, “…Is he _talented_? Clearly. But I think after this bullshit, you need something nice and, I dunno, _quiet_?”  
  
Twiddling his fingers, the dwindling blunt wedged in his palms, Shin mused. Could he…do quiet now? He appreciated the peace right now but…could he always?  
  
“Dad would shut this down” Nelly droned.  
  
“What in the world are you miscreants doing? _What_ would I shut down?”  
  
Like the magical genie he was, Yagami Yamada had appeared, poking his head in, his face scrunched. Once upon a time, Shin was sure he would have fainted if his dad saw him smoking marijuana…and he wasn’t sure if he wouldn’t now, he was just high as hell. Koji grinned lazily, continuing to enjoy his, “Hey, pop. Wanna roll one up with us?”  
  
Nelly smirked at his twin as his father just blinked languidly, “…I don’t even know what that means.”  
  
“Uh huh.”  
  
Because Nelly was the blabbermouth, _of course,_ he grunted, “Dad, what would you think if Shin said he was willing to go back into the military?”  
  
Whatever. Shin could just say everyone in this room was high. However, _shocking him almost to sobriety,_ his father’s brows simply quirked. “Wouldn’t say I’m surprised.”  
  
“Weed got to you that quick, huh?”   
  
Yamada snorted. “…As much as I wish otherwise, I have pretty stubborn children. There’s no point to get upset about it.”  
  
Shin found himself smirking, “You’re allowed to voice your reservations, dad, even if we are all stubborn. This could have gone entirely different.”  
  
“It could have” he agreed, “…It could have.”  
  
They were silent when, just as out of the blue, Lyla and his mother appeared. Oops, he was still ready to faint over those two. Dana glared daggers at specifically Koji who simply smiled because, again, _crazy_. “…Dinner is prepared if you lot haven’t gotten your fill of _drugs_.”  
  
Shin smiled awkwardly, waving his hand in front of his face as he looked off because Lyla was giving him this hard look. Yea, he was definitely not puffing weed last they saw each other two years ago.

His dad chuckled, kissing his wife’s temple, “The food smells delicious, dear, and I am _starving_. The cafeteria at the hospital over the last few days has not been filling.”  
  
“I ought to fight Matsushima for continuing to make you work this hard” she sulked, “Just because that keeps the cover too. He can still force you to take time.”  
  
Yamada shrugged, “Well, when Shin ‘mysteriously’ comes back to life, I’ll have time built up.”  
  
Right…Koji stood, setting the blunt in the ashtray and wandered to the door, smirking at their mom who leered at him. “…You do _not_ need to be smoking weed.”  
  
“Maybe, but you sure could stand to sit in the room for a few minutes.”  
  
Shin bit his lip as Koji, something of a trademark talent of his, ran perfectly at the right moment before his mom chucked a random dish towel she had at him. Koji must have escaped as usual since the woman sulked back at their dad who just smiled grimly. “Every _single_ bit your damn son.”  
  
What? Yamada just sighed. Nelly snickered, standing, “Doesn’t seem like it to me…but I guess if…dad is cool with it, Shin.”  
  
“Nothing’s written in stone, Nerimaru.”  
  
Lyla was still standing there like she had something she had on her chest. Shin nodded at the remaining family, “We’ll be down in a sec.”  
  
Her arms crossed, Lyla glanced over her shoulder as she waited for the others to descend the stairs. “…So you’ve also started smoking.”  
  
“Ugh…not really” he muttered, setting the crumpled brown nub down in the ashtray, “I mean, I…definitely will say this seems better than my cigarette habit half a year ago. I’ll get past all of it, I just can’t deny it’s very calming.”  
  
She sighed and he stood, getting closer. “Disappointed yet?”  
  
“Of course not” she grumbled, “…Weed just smells bad.”  
  
Sniffing, he raised a brow. Actually, now that she mentioned it… “I mean, I…might just be used to it but I don’t think this smells anywhere _near_ as mutant as I’d smelled before.”  
  
“Oh no, this is very fragrant, strangely” Lyla admitted, “…I guess if you continue to need it, just make sure it smells good.”  
  
Smirking, he hugged her and kissed the top of her head, “I won’t _need_ this…hopefully.”  
  
“Are…are you rejoining the military after this?”  
  
Oh. “…Not sure yet. I might be discharged due to this, I can’t see them marking me anywhere close to stable.”  
  
“But if they did, you…you would take the opportunity” she whispered.  
  
“…Maybe. It’s not…not a definitive ‘no’, as insane as it sounds. It…it wasn’t the military that shot me down out of the sky and led to this experience. If the Zechs are allowed to continue this way, they might start shooting down commercial liners too. It…was a necessary chaos. I’m…I’m still ready to help if they need it though. Really, there’s…there’s not a lot they have left to take from me except my life. And…after that? After living through all of that? That’s not going to be easy on their behalf.”  
  
Which sounded…hella cocky. Those Zechs soldiers only shot him in the legs because they were trying to _capture_ him in that moment, not kill him. It could have hit the femoral artery though, then he wouldn’t have had a chance in hell. However, he…he _lived_. As painful as that was considering how many died, as much as he felt like he came back a hollow of a person, at points deceased in his sight, the fact remained…he lived. They…they didn’t kill him. They might have destroyed him a bit but he lived to rise again and…he wasn’t ready to count himself out.  
  
Lyla gazed at him solemnly. Clearing his throat, he shrugged some, “…I entirely understand that being a dealbreaker, Lai.”  
  
“…I’m never leaving you again, Yagami Shin, no matter what that means. Even if I have to go with you.”  
  
That was actually extremely alarming. “N-No, no, please-please don’t do that.”  
  
Raising a brow, she pulled away and started to walk downstairs. “…Well, I was sort of joking. Women are separated from the men, right?”  
  
…Oh. “Um…yea, I guess I ought to talk about some of that, huh?”  
  
He followed her out of the room though she’d paused. “…What do you mean?”  
  
“…My friend that was in the desert with me? Her name is Yamada Komari” he said softly before taking a deep breath, “…I…I don’t know how to say this to you of all people, Lai, but she’s…she’s my best friend too and if it hadn’t been for her, I would have very well died out there. She had my back pretty much every time and I owe her every bit of my life. She will…she will always be special to me.”  
  
Honestly? If Lyla said that about another guy, he’d probably be at least…somewhat defensive because what the hell? Just…it was true and he had to let her know that was…that was _his_ dealbreaker if she had a problem with it like Kasumi did.   
  
Lyla gazed at him, her brows furrowing. Oh boy. “…What, are you _expecting_ or _wanting_ me to be jealous?”  
  
“Eh?? Nei-neither! I just want you to know, _platonically_ , Komari is going to be another important woman in my life. It’s not romantic or anything, I promise you that, but she…she has a significant other that doesn’t understand nor accept our relationship so I…I just want this to be very clear to you” he explained slowly.  
  
She pouted, “Shin…you’d have met this woman _regardless,_ right?”  
  
What? “I…I dunno what you mean?”  
  
“If we hadn’t broken up, you still would have gone and met her, correct? Us breaking up didn’t cause some course of events where you just mysteriously met this woman, correct?”  
  
… “…No.”  
  
Lyla sighed, walking down the steps, “Then why should I be jealous of this person that kept you alive that you would have met and befriended _anyway_? I’m depressed I have so little sense to you in your head.”  
  
Oops. “I—I didn’t mean it like that at all, Lai!” he protested, “I-I mean, if you-you said you had some guy that was super important to you, I dunno how I would take it!”  
  
“If I told you he was responsible for _saving my life_ and having my back in a tough situation, you’d be envious?”  
  
… “…I mean, I-I guess not exactly. Maybe just of the fact that you…needed him to, I suppose.”  
  
She smiled, reaching back and squeezing his hand. “You’re right. I guess I do have envy over that. But if I had to choose you having her as a friend or having you be dead in the desert, I would never choose the latter.”  
  
Man. Maybe it was the drugs but he was getting a little more…confident in his standings.  
  
 _“You are just a waste of time, at this point, Yagami-san. I’m sure an amusement to Lyla but very little else. You have very little to offer in the way of your career choices and even less with your bloodline. A quarterbreed begot by a half-blooded pauper and a fallen house. I think it’s about time you understood your place—and it is most certainly not in my daughter’s presence.”  
  
_ …Except that. That…that needed to be resolved before anything else.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _Reminded that, over two years ago, Lyla allowed him and his family to be lambasted by her father in front of him, Shin felt himself cool off. She hadn’t offered specific apologies or reasons but he didn’t know how to exactly ask for them either. She…she had to know how much that hurt him.  
  
Of course, he fell asleep away from her and was doing fine with not being disturbed by nightmares. However, any light branch or breeze woke him and it took him a few minutes to go back to sleep. Or an hour, depending. Sometimes his mind still wandered with him in it. But…it was that sound again from the last couple nights prior that woke him and…had his full attention.  
  
Shin swallowed hard, listening to her pleasure herself though it was different this time. It was only the sound of her body, not escaping from her lips. Taking a deep breath, he clenched his eyes shut. No, no, just…she was horny and apparently it was keeping her up. No...no LISTENING.  
  
…Ugh, she sounded so…so wet though…  
  
Turning over, he moved into the curve of her back. He alarmed her, he felt her heart racing. Just… “Lyla, can…can I?”  
  
“What?” she rasped.  
  
“Can I…I-I want you. I want you so bad.”  
  
She inhaled as his fingers slipped down her stomach, sliding under her soaking wet panties and stroking her clit. No, no, she… “I’m sorry. Can I touch you?”  
  
“Please” she whimpered, “Please touch me.”  
  
Oh man. Grabbing the ends of the shirt of his she was wearing to bed, he roughly pulled it up, wrapping his finger around her hard nipple. She lifted her leg to give him easier access…oh fuck.   
  
Shin trembled, his fingers sinking into her flesh. Oh, she…she felt so damn good. Oh fuck. Whipping his penis out, he slid inside of her, a soft moan escaping her lips. Oh fuck, it FELT so good…  
  
…Or did it?  
  
Alarmingly, it…felt good but it didn’t feel good at the same time? Actually, it wasn’t so much it didn’t feel GOOD, he just wasn’t sure he was feeling anything. Was…was he really…completely broken?  
  
He looked up, dismayed, only to find Bajiru standing there disapprovingly. Oops.  
  
_Sitting straight up, inhaling hard, Shin looked around in confusion. It…was about four in the morning, Lyla was fast asleep and _not_ pleasuring herself and he literally just had a sex dream. Groaning deeply, he covered his face and shook his head. His damn dreams were going to be the death of him one way or another.  
  
“Shin…?”  
  
Jolting, he smiled quickly in Lyla’s direction. She was gazing at him sleepily, “What’s the matter…? Did you have a bad dream?”  
  
“N-No…just a weird one. Sorry to disturb you” he smiled, awkwardly crawling back under the covers.  
  
“I’s fine…”  
  
Woo boy. He…he may have…needed some answers on why what happened happened, but his body sure didn’t care. Just…

Why?  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Day…17 with Lyla.  
  
Once again, like many a night he was finding in these latter days, he found himself wide awake, staring at the ceiling in, now, wonder. It…stood that there was…somewhat reason to this madness. And maybe biases were at play in his brain as he didn’t…this frequently but that didn’t mean she couldn’t or didn’t have to.  
  
Yesterday, he caught her with a vibrator.  
  
It was an honest mistake in every sense, he truly thought he’d seen her go somewhere with Jill and he was going to lie down for a nap. Naturally, given either he was mentally training himself not to sleep that deeply or wide awake listening to her go at it with herself, he was getting a little tired. He’d thought he could sleep a little deeper since she wasn’t in bed with him…  
  
So yea, he opened the door and came to a dead complete stop. She was lying in the bed they were sharing, her legs spread and her knees bent as she held the toy inside of her, crooning with delight.   
  
And he honestly turned _right back around_ and left because _answers first,_ Shin! Oh, but, oh no, no, that wasn’t how temptation worked. _“Shin_?”  
  
Oh, fuck. He’d told himself not to say anything, having stood outside the door like a statue. She tried again. _“Shin? Is that you?”  
  
_ Like a big ol’ damn _dummy_ thinking maybe she…needed something _nonsexual_ , he answered, _“A-Ah, Lyla, I thought you’d gone out with Jill.”_  
  
 _“No, she had purchased something for me…come in.”  
  
_ It went against every single _ounce_ of his judgment but he entered, figuring she’d have covered up or stopped what she was doing. When he walked in, while she had certainly stopped with the vibrator, she was sitting up on her haunches, half naked. He just stared at this… _temptress_ from the door, stuffing his hands in his pockets. _Answers_.

 _“Were you going to nap? I can go into the other room”_ she’d offered sweetly.  
  
 _“N-No, I mean, um…take your time. I can go nap in the other room.”  
  
“Won’t you help me?”  
  
“…Huh?”  
  
“I’m good at it now but…it’d be different if you helped.”  
  
_He had to give it to her, she was really, really good. Like…really, really, really good. “ _U-Uh, I…I don’t know if that’s…that’s such a good idea, Lai.”  
  
_ She proceeded to lean back on her palms, opening her legs again like gates to ecstasy and pouted. “ _I miss you touching me.”  
  
_ So…yea, that went about the direction…it would have gone the two years prior. He really had given all the credit to Nesha for making his mind goo but Lyla? Lyla made his brain and all faculties not even soup but _broth_. There was nothing there.   
  
Like a zombie, after shutting the door, he wandered close to her. He…still wasn’t down for the count yet. _“L-Lyla, look, let’s…let’s talk first…”  
  
“Okay. What about?”  
  
_Mind, she asked this while taking his hand and sliding it up her shirt around her soft creamy nice breast. Oh no, she had _no_ intention of them talking. “… _I’m serious, Lyla.”  
  
_ She’d stuck out her tongue, _“Then why are you playing with my nipple?”  
  
_ Because he liked nipples, damn it! This time it _definitely_ wasn’t a dream, he felt the little point between his fingertips and rubbed it. Oh, he missed playing with her tits…  
  
She lifted her shirt and those fiddles started playing again. “ _Suck one. You used to like that.”  
  
_ He was now perfectly aware the analogy of finding water in the desert and it didn’t even come _close_ to what he had felt in that moment. No, his _reaction_ was like him finding water in the desert, he leaned right over and went to town.  
  
 _“Mm, Shin, it feels so good”_ she’d rasped.  
  
No, Shin! This was a trap! Pulling away, he’d shaken his head, “ _Lyla_.”  
  
Alas, he sat there, watching unwaveringly as her hand wrapped around her breast, rubbing her hard nipple before grabbing the vibrator again. She released her teat to drag back the hood of her lower nub, plunging the shaft of the purple toy inside of her sex, two shuddering apparatus attached to the device straddling her exposed clit.  
  
His mouth was dry as she chirped, her sex jumping and contracting. “ _Mm, mm. Shin, it feels so good.”  
  
_ Was he hard? Extremely. That definitely could have very well been him inside of her. She had started to pump it back and forth, her toes curling as she exhaled sultry little utterances. Oh, she was _good._

His backbone stayed in place only because she came, cum leaking down her pink folds as she pulled it out. She gave him a look probably because he didn’t pounce on her and start pounding her into next year. Oh, she was _close_. One more enticement like that and they’d be back to square one. Instead, a power play of sorts, he slid his finger into a delve slightly, pulling back teasingly, nipping it. “…We talk about what happened, I’ll eat you out all night.”  
  
Lyla just blinked at him…before taking his hand and repeating the action, running his fingertips across her sticky sex. His brows briefly furrowed before he stared, flabbergasted, as she took the finger and sucked it before swirling her tongue around the tip. She blinked at him, smiling, standing and skipping to the bathroom. “Well, that’s your loss, Yagami Shin.”  
  
Oh, she was _damn good_.

He just wanted to _talk_! Why was the communication so hard for them!? Frustrated in multiple ways and seething, he covered his face as she sleep masturbated. It was sleep masturbating tonight. At this point he could tell the difference by pacing, sounds, and the intensity of her arousal. Sitting straight up, he glared. No. No more. Enough was enough. _“Lyla_.”  
  
Again, she was asleep, so he shook her shoulder. She let out a little sleepy sound before shifting a bit. “Shin…? Wha’s the matter?”  
  
“You gave me my ring back. I came over, your dad calls me the scum of the Earth that is a waste of time and doesn’t deserve you and insults my family. You didn’t even say anything, you didn’t tell me why you gave the ring back—all of it. Why?”  
  
“Can’t we talk about it later, Shin…?”  
  
“ _No_. I had literally _no_ intention of telling you my mounting psychoses and you still managed to get them out of me. I am tired of this one-sided… _thing_.”  
  
She turned over on her side, her green eyes groggy. “…It’s not one-sided because I want it to be, Shin.”  
  
“Explain.”  
  
And she rolled her eyes. Ugh, forget it. Climbing out of bed, he started for the door. Lyla sat up, “Shin, where are you going?”  
  
“I’ll sleep in the other room. Night.”  
  
Not giving her an opportunity to say anything else to dissuade him, he walked to his ‘entertainment’ room. He had a decent couch in there. Grabbing a pillow and blanket, he stretched across it on his side. Oh well. He…wasn’t mad, just…disappointed, he supposed.  
  
He groaned in his head when he heard footsteps behind him. Of course. ‘Shin.”  
  
Ignoring her, he made a face when she got closer, kneeling behind him. “…If I told you I can’t tell you yet, that it’s something I _alone_ need to resolve, will you…just give me time?”  
  
“It’s been _two years_ , Lyla.”  
  
“I know that” she said quietly, “Please. It’s…it’s not that I don’t trust you, that I don’t want you to know. It’s just all that you’ve told me about yourself over the years, I…I know what you’d do and I need to handle this differently than that. I don’t want you to get involved and take a fall for us.”  
  
… _What_? Shin turned over, glaring, “…What is that even supposed to _mean_ , Lyla? I can’t be involved with your family like you’re involved with mine? Because I don’t know how to act because you know what I would do?”  
  
She looked exasperated. “I didn’t say you don’t know how to act. It’d be appropriate and it’d be right. But it wouldn’t be what we need and…and I don’t want to risk anyone.”  
  
He was confused. As hell. “Can you give me… _some hint_?”  
  
“…You’ve seen it in your family. Outside of it. And you know something is off in mine. You probably…just never thought to look past me.”  
  
Oh, so a brain teaser. Annoyed, he closed his eyes. Something in _his_ family that was going on in _her_ family but it wasn’t apparently _her_ but _she_ had to resolve it.   
  
…Well, unfortunately the first part of that teaser had a lot of open doors, his family had been through a lot. Just… “Lyla, my dad…my dad said my mom put up with abuse to protect him and that…that eats at him, I can see it. I…I know it’s not entirely the same, not really even _close_ , but if…if it’s something I can help you resolve, I don’t…don’t want you to protect me if I can help you.”  
  
With a smile, she stroked his cheek, “…Well, maybe you just have best friends that can’t help that.”  
  
Damn it. Shin leered at her before grumbling, “…All right, Lyla. I won’t…give you a deadline or something because I don’t know what it is but I…I’m still ambivalent until I know.”  
  
She nodded solemnly, kissing his cheek, “I know. And…it’s not something I can wait much longer on either.”  
  
God, why wouldn’t she just _tell him_? Now he was mostly _curious_! She tugged his hand, looking at him pleadingly, “Come back to bed, please.”  
  
Ugh. “…Fine.”  
  
Walking behind her, he was tempted to just stay until she was asleep and maybe go downstairs to watch television. Or pretend to and fall asleep on the couch. He wasn’t _as_ irritated, just exhausted.  
  
Or now completely confused as Lyla retrieved a box from the nightstand drawer which housed her ‘toy’ and appeared to be heading _back_ to the other room. Now wait a minute. “Um, Lai?”  
  
“I was having a nice dream before you woke me so I’ll just be a few minutes” she yawned.  
  
Shin sucked his cheek, his brows lowering as he stared at her pensively. So… “So, you…kicked me out of my own entertainment room so you can…go entertain yourself there?”  
  
“Just _briefly_ ” she insisted.  
  
He really had a lot of special people in his life, actually. And… “…Come back.”  
  
She frowned, walking back over as he sat up on the edge of the bed. To be honest, he…wasn’t sure he even knew how to function this way anymore. It seemed…self-serving. At least partially.   
  
Lifting her t-shirt over her naked breasts, he wrapped his tongue around her nipple, suckling as he traced his hand down the small of her back, gliding down the curve of her ass, and slipping underneath her panties.  
  
Lyla rasped as he ran his pointer finger down her slick folds. She was dreaming, huh? “Who were you dreaming about?” he whispered, pulling away from her tit.  
  
“You.”  
  
He smiled. Predictable. “You can tell me the truth, I don’t mind.”  
  
He yelped, startled, when she gave him a fast shove back. Leering, she climbed into bed beside him, untying his pajama pants. “It’s _always_ been you, baka.”  
  
Flustering, he bit his lip as she gave him a slight pump before pushing his length against his belly, licking his balls thoroughly. She drew one into her mouth, sucking, her tongue pushing back and forth…  
  
Fuck, it felt _good_. Managing to get his eyes open, dazed, he pulled her lower body to his face. She immediately pulled away from her task, sulking, “I won’t be able to focus and you know that.”  
  
“Oh, I think you’ll figure it out” he purred, pushing the fabric of her undergarment aside to reveal her sex.   
  
Mm. Mm, he forgot how good she tasted. With a groan, he grabbed her waist and turned her over on her back, pulling her lower body up to his face as he sat on his haunches, “Mmph, fuck, come here.”  
  
Lyla whimpered as he sucked her clit without abandon, the fleshy protrusion quivering and erect. Jerking her panties off a little rougher than he intended, he grunted, stroking himself as her body responded in full, her excitement running down her thighs. “A-Ah, Shin, n-no, I-I want to please you.”  
  
He still wasn’t very concerned in that area, his mouth curling around her folds as she choked, moaning, as her body shook. Relaxing her against the bed, he rubbed her hip. Well, he wasn’t certain if he was rusty or not given she was apparently more than half way there before he got involved, so…  
  
Shin raised a brow as, after she recovered, she sat up and very faintly pushed him back. Lyla used to kind of shove him around…oh, maybe she realized he was _nuts_ and it might trigger something. About to sink into a depression, he ended up whizzing by that stop to complete _shock_ as she sat on top of his crotch and slid his cock inside of her. Oh damn.  
  
“F-Fuck, wait” he blurted.  
  
Oh shit, she rode him so smoothly, he _forgot_. Eyes rolling back, he rasped, “L-Lyla, wait, pr-protection.”  
  
“I’ll take Plan B” she whined.  
  
Did that even _work_? He was not comfortable in the idea of being a father right now! About to…insist, he trembled as she twerked her ass up and down. Well…for everything else that had changed, this line of losing focus on being safe sure stayed the same. Managing to pull out before he came, _something_ rushing through his veins, he gazed at Lyla and thought he saw _fire_ in her eyes. She…wasn’t done. And, frankly, he…wasn’t certain he was either.  
  
…So much for being ambivalent.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _“You don’t deserve her.”  
  
_ What?  
  
Shin woke up, absolutely dazed and confused. His hair was damp and wavy and he had…zero recollection of going to sleep. Looking drearily to the alarm clock behind him, he found it was around 11 in the morning. With a yawn, he sat up and looked to his side. Directly beside him was Lyla, stretched out very weirdly on her side, her arm lying across the bed limply, naked.  
  
Adrenaline, maybe. Ringing. Sounds. Panic. His senses went into overload and he felt himself start to hyperventilate. No, no, no. “ _Lyla_.”  
  
He frantically picked her up in his arms, about to scream for help. This. This was _why_. He couldn’t deserve _anything now_. He _didn’t_ deserve her!  
  
“Shin…?”  
  
He looked down, shaking uncontrollably. Lyla looked super puzzled, one of her eyes wider than the other and very much half-asleep. “Wha is it…? Wha’z the matter…?”  
  
“ _Lyla_. Did I hurt you?”  
  
The pink haired woman _snorted_. SNORTED…and then _went back to sleep_!! Shin leered at her as he still tried…to calm. Looking toward the bathroom, he finally paused the manic racing of his imagination.  
  
…Oh. He… went and took a shower. She…came with him into the shower and they screwed around some more, barely dried off, and dragged themselves into bed in exhaustion at around 6 this morning.   
  
Exhaling hard, he rested Lyla back on the bed and covered his face with his hands, quietly crying. Why couldn’t he just be _stable_ anymore? That depression he overlooked last night finally reared its ugly head as he stood, dressing as silently as possible and wandering downstairs. He…he didn’t deserve her. Not when…when he couldn’t even discern if he’d _hurt her or not_.

On the second level, he meandered toward the fabric room, not surprised to find his mother hard at work there. Well…somewhat. She kept some pretty wild hours herself. The woman appeared to be working faster than usual so maybe she had a rush order. Turning, not wanting to bother her, that Magic of Moms set into play. Her back was to him but she called: “Shin?”  
  
“…Morning, mama.”  
  
The woman turned to him, pins in her mouth, “Morning, Sweetie Plum…what’s the matter?”  
  
He had washed his face but he still looked red and blotchy right now so it was no hiding he was an emotional disaster. Wandering in, he knelt and rested his cheek on her knee, “…I’m a monster. And I don’t know how to convince myself I’m not.”  
  
Dana’s brows furrowed, putting the pins into a cushion and shaking her head, “Shin, you are…well aware what a monster is in human flesh.”  
  
“I’m guilty of a lot of the same things he is, mom. Now, I can’t even…sleep beside the person I love without waking up thinking I’ve killed them because that’s what I’ve done in the past. I killed someone coming out of rest.”  
  
The woman that risked her very life to birth him pouted, holding his cheeks, “…You know, you’re older than your papa was when we got married right now? It’s a marvel to me. My babies made it.”  
  
He frowned as she stroked his hair, smiling, “…Your papa has a tough time living with himself too. You’re both very gentle spirits and I think you both believe the universe ought to be more balanced than it is. You mourn humanity’s…grievances and take their evil upon yourself. I’ll admit, your…mama doesn’t digest things that way, Sweetie Plum. I can only account for myself and I can only account for what I was able to do against the wrong. You were shot out of the sky, Shin, because they believed you all were closing in on their wickedness. You crossed a desert they don’t even own and they tried to kill you to guard their wickedness. You did things you should not have had to because, again, like I told you the first time, these people _chose_ this route. Don’t…don’t take their burden, Shin.”  
  
“…It’s so much easier said than done, mama” he rasped.  
  
“Well, of course it is” she assured, hugging his neck, “And you probably think, ‘well, she’s my mama, of course she is going to justify what I did’. And you’re right…to a degree. I’m able to call out you all’s wrongs though and…and I just can’t feel it with you, Shin.”  
  
…Right. “And, when this smoke clears, if people try to judge you, I’ll stab them” she sighed airily, pulling away to pick up the pins.  
  
Shin smirked, rubbing his wet eyes, “Yea, you sure Koji didn’t take after _you_?”  
  
“Tuh, _hardly_.”  
  
She squeezed his hand as he stood, murmuring, “…I will say, Shin, that the living with it is the hardest part of…of any trauma. It chases you and it anoints you in every possible feeling. None of them usually feel good. But…if you can’t push past it, walk beside it until you can. Don’t let whatever it is overtake you.”  
  
“…Yes. Thank you, mama.”  
  
Dazed, he wandered back upstairs to the third level to just relax or try to. He guessed…this was his concern: accepting that everything around him was okay when he wasn’t.  
  
Coming into the room, he paused. It hadn’t been that long in the scheme of things, about ten minutes, and Lyla had been near comatose when he left. Now, she was awake and pulling on a thick, dowdy gray dress, pulling her hair up. Um. “…Lai?”  
  
She looked up at him solemnly before her brows dropped. “…What’s the matter?”  
  
“Nothing…”  
  
His childhood friend scowled some, getting close to him and brushing her fingers over his eyelashes, “So was I not dreaming about your freak out?”  
  
“No.”  
  
She shook her head, kissing his cheek, “Please have just a little bit more faith in yourself, Shin.”  
  
“And please understand I can _hurt you_ , Lyla. I’m not—I’m not _entirely_ crazy and just fabricating things in my imagination. It is possible and I want you to acknowledge it. I’m not some…some project to fix, these cracks are here.”  
  
Lyla blinked at him languidly and he was…aggravated. Maybe…maybe Bajiru was right. It…it wasn’t a hill they could climb together.  
  
“I’m not here to fix or hold you together, Yagami Shin. And I am acknowledging what you told me—but I’m human. I fell asleep beside you after we had sex and I’m sorry I don’t fear you enough to _shirk away in terror_. You expect a whole lot out of me.”  
  
He found himself gaping as she shook her head, walking toward the door and picking up a pair of shoes nearby. “…I just got a call. I’ll make it look like I’m not coming from here but I need to go home.”  
  
…Home? “…Is everything okay?”  
  
“Probably not.”  
  
What?? And she kept walking _away_ with that! Following her, alarmed, Shin shook his head, “T-Then why are you _going_? They haven’t called you in almost three weeks!”  
  
She shrugged because all he knew about anything was a fucking _riddle_ that made no sense to him. Lyla was almost out the front door, something he couldn’t even peek out of right now. _Wait_. “L-Lyla…are…are you coming back?”  
  
Wow. Real convenient, Shin. You spend every other minute coping in your head that you need to push her away or that she deserved better than your nightmares then when she has a way out you panic and don’t want her to go? Classy. Gnawing his lip, rebuking himself and about to recall the question, Lyla paused. She looked back at him before smiling. “Baka.”  
  
He made a face as she just left, elusive to a tee. What was even going on? Lyla was out of school, meaning they should want to keep an eye on her. They call her almost three weeks later? And whatever she was going over there for probably wasn’t good? Was…was it another suitor?  
  
Undeniably anxious, Shin shook his head and went to the kitchen to prepare lunch for himself and whomever else was around. Koji had been up super later working on a term paper so he was probably knocked out and dad had left for work early last night. He…was alone.  
  
Preparing a light lunch of pickled vegetables and a bit of rice, he took a plate to his mama, knowing she wouldn’t stop to eat it but figuring he would offer. Dana looked up with a smile. “Set it on the table, I’ll be down in a moment.”  
  
Okay…he peeked into Koji’s room, finding him sitting up and rubbing his face. Poor guy. This…this was hopefully almost over. “Uh, morning. I have some lunch on the table if you’re hungry.”  
  
“Thanks.”  
  
Mr. Chaos was not a morning person. Or…late morning person. Settling in his seat away from the window when he got back to the dining table, he picked up his chopsticks.  
  
 _You’ve seen it in your family. Outside of it. And you know something is off in mine. You probably…just never thought to look past me_.

Past her? Why would he look _past her_? She was his main concern! Annoyed again, he smiled as his mom came and sat beside him, saying ‘itedakimasu’ and digging in. “Um, I of course know _how_ to sew, mom, even though it might not be on your level but I can help if you need it.”  
  
“Oh, you don’t have to do that, dear. You can spend more time with Lyla.”  
  
… “She, uh…had to go home for a little bit. I asked her if she was coming back and she called me a baka.”  
  
Dana looked bewildered before her brows quirked, “Oh, well, that means she’ll be back. Might not be any time soon though.”  
  
Wha? “W-What do you mean?”  
  
Sipping the tea he had prepared, Dana looked pensive. “…I can’t put my direct finger on her family. It’s an old family like mine was…but for as screwed up as my family was, we were still pretty unique. A matriarchal family is…rare in our parts. My mom ran everything and my dad was just a figurehead that she pretended to defer to even though she didn’t.”  
  
… “Well, that…submissive wife stuff is kind of outdated anyway, right? I mean, at least she was that progressive?”  
  
His mother scoffed. “I would never, and I mean _never,_ give that woman that credit, Sweetie Plum. She ran the household like a sexist man would. I was supposed to be chaste, demure, weak, and powerless because I wasn’t the _first_ daughter. As I was the third, I was supposed to be married off to a man who would probably only value those…assets. Weirdly enough, your grandfather was the only one that gave me an inch of progressive thought by saying I shouldn’t be stuck in the house. Or, apparently, he’s the reason I was able to carry you to term.”  
  
…Oh. A little…shocked by this overload of information as his mom continued eating, he tried to…assess it. So… “So, I…I know Lyla is supposed to embody those ‘assets’, just…why? It’s a different era now, she can leave.”  
  
Dana chewed, gazing off before her eyes diverted to Koji dragging his feet into the kitchen. “…If it was a different circumstance, where I didn’t have your father’s future at stake, I would have left too, Shin. Your father introduced me to the mindset that I could though, so, without him, I wouldn’t have. However, if it struck me, I would have left. However, that means something is holding her back.”  
  
But…it couldn’t be _him_. Lyla and him are the same age. His dad was young enough to legally be with his mother to a point until Yamada aged up and woosh, they were no longer legal. There was nothing like that here.  
  
With a yawn, Koji sat down and sipped a glass of water he brought over. “…So I take it Lyla’s gone?”  
  
“Mm. Apparently she got a call to come home” Shin muttered.  
  
“Say the word, I’ll bust over there in a heartbeat.”  
  
…”…Would you?”  
  
“No, he will not” Dana said dryly, “Relax. If she’s gone too long, I’ll have the best…purpose in going over. My second born would just be insane.”  
  
Koji simply smiled while Shin groaned. Maybe, but if Koji was great at anything, it was busting shit up. He just…he just wanted to understand.  
  
 _You don’t deserve her.  
  
_ …Well, something aside from that.

  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _By his account? Being gone from eleven in the morning to eleven at night was way too long. He had helped his mother out until about three, napped until five, cooked dinner at six, ate that dinner with the kids until about seven, watched television with them until nine, then they went about their business so he had two hours to think about how this was WAY TOO LONG.  
  
Sitting by the steps in front of the door, he kneaded his hands. This was possessive. Unhealthy. Toxic, even. She had all the right in the world to go anywhere she pleased for twelve hours. He didn’t need to know what she was doing, to doubt. That wasn’t his place.  
  
…It was just the anxiety of not knowing what…what she was going through. And, the anxiety of not knowing if…if she was about to not come back again.  
  
The doorknob jiggled a bit, causing him to jump. It was probably his dad though.  
  
His heart raced when Lyla entered the house, holding a small bag. She looked…fine. Nothing looked out of place except she seemed tired. Just…she…she came back.  
  
Lyla blinked at him, startled, “…Don’t tell me you’ve been sitting there, waiting for me?”  
  
“…For about an hour. I…I was worried.”  
  
Standing, he hesitantly reached out to her, half expecting her to finally shirk away, as she put it. Instead, she curled into his embrace at ease, wrapping her arms around him. That…that part of him that was in turmoil that found peace in that moment felt…amazing. Kissing the top of her head, he absently released that terse bun, her long tresses falling in waves. “…You like wearing your hair up or something?”  
  
“No” she sighed, “But wearing your hair down is immature, you know?”  
  
“Bull.”  
  
“So mean” she teased, “Have you eaten?”  
  
“Mm. You?”  
  
Nodding in confirmation as well, her green eyes brightened. He just… “While I was at school, I got into more activities with flowers and herbs. It’s more holistic than you’re probably used to in your family but I started making bath salts with aromas and whatnot—a lot of people told me it helped them sleep and relax so, we should take a bath.”  
  
A bath? He made a face, not sure he wanted to be boiling in flowers. We though…? “…I guess it’s worth a shot.”  
  
She looked excited. Again, he was still surprised Koji’s magical blend of weed helped him at all, let alone…smells. Following her up the steps, he smirked a bit as she stripped down naked in front of him at ease. Never a dull moment. “You’re something else, Ms. Okamoto.”  
  
“What? You’ve seen everything now!”  
  
He chuckled. He had. Taking off his t-shirt, dropping it into the hamper, he stepped into his shower to rinse and wash as Lyla went to work with her ‘blend’. When he came out, she shooed him into the tub and took his place in the stall. He stared at the pink water with bubbles floating on top. He wasn’t…certain the last time he sat in a bathtub.  
  
Stepping in, he sank down low and…oh man. The warmth alone felt intoxicating. Closing his eyes, he listened to Lyla’s soft humming and, admittedly, felt kind of freer.   
  
Lyla exited and sat on the opposite side of the oval clawfoot tub. The thing was…huge, it almost was enough for him to stretch out. Almost. Lyla had pinned her hair up, kneeing over to sit between his legs. “Here, this shampoo is nice too.”  
  
Shampoo? She took the wand attached to the wall and dampened his hair again, pouring a bit of the amber wash into her hands, and gently massaged it into his scalp. Mm. “…Dunno if I’ve ever had anyone wash my hair before.”  
  
“It’s nice, right?” she gushed.  
  
He idly opened his eyes, just right eye level at slippery breasts as she continued to scrunch her fingers against his head. “Oh yea…”  
  
“Perv” she snickered.  
  
He smiled while she guarded his eyes, rinsing out the lather and replacing it with a light conditioner. Sinking down onto her haunches, she stared at him with a frown. He blinked, “…What’s wrong?”  
  
“…I guess I hadn’t really seen you naked in the light.”  
  
It was somewhat amazing that Shin took three bullets to the same shoulder. A miracle that they hit his shoulder, really. Just a sign of poor marksmanship though, they were trying to pierce his heart and missed. Those guys weren’t like the ones that were able to hit both of his legs. Those were experts. _

_As a result, across his shoulder were three healed over indentions, two with a minor bit of fissuring lines that had a bit of a keloid. His arm was similar, three small scars sprinkled across his bicep and forearm. He couldn’t recall where it happened, but apparently someone had scratched him up good, a light raised line of skin starting at his collar bone and stopping mid-upper chest. Physical scars, he…could deal with though.  
  
Pressing her finger into one of the marks on his shoulder, she whispered, “…Did it hurt?”  
  
“Like hell.”  
  
She slowly turned around before leaning back against his chest. Hmm? Playing with the bubbles, she whispered, “Perhaps I spoke too soon.”  
  
“About what?”  
  
“…Supporting you. I…I don’t want anyone shooting at you. Every one of those scars means someone was actively trying to take your life.”  
  
Swallowing, Shin nodded solemnly. “They are.”  
  
She kissed the back of his hand, falling silent. Lavender, perhaps? Jasmine, maybe. Some chamomile…while he wanted to ask her any litany of things, especially about what she had to do over there, he couldn’t deny he was getting a bit sleepy. Whether that was because of this flowery concoction or the fact he was relaxing in a bathtub with Lyla, he wasn’t sure. Could’ve been both…  
  
“…This is nice” he murmured, resting his cheek against the back of her head.  
  
“Mm…”  
  
After another twenty minutes, they got out, rinsing off the suds and drying off. Lying in bed, he bit his lip, a bit amused, as Lyla rubbed his feet with more of her therapy oils. “…Lyla, you’re too much.”  
  
“What? Everyone likes a good foot rub sometimes.”  
  
Leaning back lazily, he drawled, “You trying to get into my pants or something?”  
  
“Well, you’re not getting THAT massaged tonight, Yagami Shin, I’m sleepy.”  
  
With a laugh, he shook his head, “And I’m the perv, eh?”  
  
Sticking out her tongue, she went to the bathroom to wash her hands while he stealthily slipped half a pill. The bath and massage worked as far as his anxiety wasn’t beating into his psyche and he felt…peace. Just sleeping wise, that…that could very well be disrupted by things outside of his control.  
  
Lyla returned and crawled into bed, looking at him wearily. “…Shin?”  
  
“Hmm?”  
  
“…The way…father always drilled things, I wouldn’t be allowed to…to continue anything with you. So, I thought, one day, we’d…we’d both end up married to other people, perhaps we’d send each other letters or correspond once and a while and…and perhaps it’d be fine. But you…you rightfully pushed me away after everything that happened. You gave me back the things I gave you and…and I couldn’t bear it. It hurt so much and when…when the days turned into weeks and months and years, I didn’t…I didn’t want it to be like that at all. I don’t want it to be like that at all. But I can’t…I can’t have what I want.”  
  
“…Sure you can. If you want it.”  
  
She sulked at him as he pushed a few strands of hair back, “…It’s there, if you want it.”  
  
“…I love you, Shin.”  
  
“I love you as well.”  
  
“But I…I do have to tell you…”  
  
_When he woke up, she was fucking gone again.  
  
Her stuff was gone, there was no trace of her, and he…he didn’t even know. What was it this time? Or was it the same as last time?  
  
Sitting in the bay window of the room, staring out, he stared at that borealis of death that struck him at his lowest. He…could probably break his neck jumping from here.   
  
Why didn’t she just tell him ‘goodbye’?  
  
“Yo, Shin…?”  
  
He glared back over his shoulder at Koji, the person that made it out to be like he and Lyla were destined to be. Hardly, when she just kept fucking running without a word. He couldn’t even go get lambasted a second time right now and she knew it. Didn’t she…didn’t she know he was hurt enough?  
  
Koji’s brows were furrowed, holding the landline phone. “…Does…Etherlink mean anything to you?”  
  
… _What_? Shin stared at his brother, his agony melting into… _something_. If he stretched, he imagined it felt like what he’d feel seeing a ghost. “…Respond Siren.”  
  
While Koji had question written all over his face, he replaced the phone to his ear and drawled, “…Siren.”  
  
Heart racing, Shin jumped up when he heard Colonel Teramoto’s voice. Holy shit. Koji handed the phone over to him and Shin blurted, “Siren.”  
  
“Good job, Yagami. You made it.”  
  
His blood was pumping so hard, he wasn’t sure he was even…hearing. “S-Sir?”  
  
“Get dressed in your formals and pack a bag, a car marked X7333 is picking you up in the next hour. I’ll debrief you when you, Yamada, Itoh, Koike, and Soga arrive.”  
  
“Y-Yes sir.”  
  
Pressing end, he stared at the device in… _disbelief_ before looking to Koji. “…It’s over, Koji. It’s done. I’m…I’m not dead anymore.”  
  
“…Shit. Really?” Koji said, wide-eyed.  
  
Shin…nodded and Koji looked around, his face a bit uncharacteristically amazed. “…Wow. That’s…that’s awesome. I mean, I didn’t…do much, but fuck, it feels like I finished a mission too.”  
  
Punching his brother’s shoulder, he scoffed, “The hell do you mean ‘you didn’t do anything’? You put your life on hold and got your endeavor pushed back so you could fight me sometimes, you did _a lot_. You finished this mission with me. Thank you.”  
  
Koji simply nodded as Shin rushed to get his stuff out of the closet. Finding the black formal military attire, he quickly combed his hair so the ponytail was obscured by his cover. “Koji, is mom here?”  
  
“She had to run out to one of the stores in Hokkaido. She probably won’t be back before you leave. How long do you think you’ll be gone?” Koji questioned, sitting on Shin’s bed.  
  
Throwing his duffel bag on the bed, Shin shook his head, “…No idea. Hopefully not long.”  
  
Nodding, Koji leaned back on his palms….weird. Shin leered a bit as he packed the things he did have considering most of his gear was back at the barracks, last he saw it. “You aren’t going to ask where Lyla is?”  
  
“Well, the way you looked at me when I walked in…didn’t figure I wanted to ruin this happy moment” he droned.  
  
Damn right. Zipping up the bag after putting his toiletries inside, he slung it on his shoulder. “…I’m hurt but I guess I don’t have time to be.”  
  
“Well, at least she left a letter this time?”  
  
What? Shin’s eyes narrowed. “…No, she didn’t.”  
  
“I mean, unless you just have random pieces of pink paper shoved under your pillows…”  
  
Eh? Shin swiftly turned to his bed, going over and lifting up his pillow. No letter, what--  
  
…She wouldn’t have reached for his head like that. Swallowing that, he looked at her pillow and indeed found that same stationary from when she returned the watch. Oh man, he…he couldn’t. “…Read it for me, Koji.”  
  
Koji, nonplussed, retrieved the piece of paper and looked it over. Finally, his voice low, he muttered, “…Dear Shin, I was trying to tell you last night after our bath that my father was furious and going to have me followed. With Marianne’s help, I was able to sneak out to return to you but I had to be back at home early this morning. I couldn’t wake you to explain but I didn’t want to be a liability to your mission. Like you said, my father would carelessly and callously undermine all you’ve done and I couldn’t live with myself if that occurred because of me. I’m sorry that I am breaking my promise of leaving you but I didn’t almost lose you to have your bravery destroyed. I’m here waiting. I love you, Lyla.”  
  
… _Fuck_. “Fan-fucking-tastic. I was doped into a coma and told her not to touch me as I was sleeping anyway so I couldn’t even see her off” he snarled, taking the letter from Koji to review himself.  
  
“Well, hey, fate smiled upon you, it’s over the same day she left” Koji nodded.  
  
Her fucking dad. And fucking him, jumping to conclusions. Hell, maybe she left a letter that day too, who knows! Frustrated, he took a deep breath. “…One problem at a time.”  
  
First one? To see…if that so-called ‘bravery’ paid off.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
 **End Notes:  
  
** I dunno how to describe Etherlink in Rune Factory, it’s…not a spell, maybe? Or it might be, I dunno. It’s in Rune Factory   
  
Siren is one of the bosses in Rune Prana. Here, it’s Shin’s assigned code word.


	18. New Set of Eyes

**Chapter 18:** New Set of Eyes  
  
 **Author’s Note: _WARNING:_** Hateful language from an enemy character.   
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Yagami Shin wasn’t certain where they were taken. It looked like an underground bunker about two hours from his home in the middle of nowhere. Nauseous, Shin took a deep breath when the black non-descript vehicle pulled into a lower level garage. Following four stoic officers that said nothing to him this entire time, he entered a sterile almost office area.   
  
He couldn’t help smile to see Yamada Komari sitting at the table. She smiled smugly at him as he took a seat where his name plate was, to her left. Itoh Kasumi was to her right, her eyes closed. Well then. “Yamada. Itoh.”  
  
“Yagami” Komari nodded as he sat.  
  
Glancing down at her leg, he felt that gut punch to see just one limb. She slapped his arm, muttering under her breath, “Look, we got away with it but I couldn’t explain me randomly having a prosthetic, right?”  
  
Oh yea, true. He nodded and she shot him a leer, mouthing ‘did you get her?’. Shin smiled some and nodded. Sort of.   
  
Koike and Soga were shuffled into the room and…well, Shin shouldn’t spread an ounce of judgment and he wasn’t but they looked like hell. Soga had a notable pallor and Koike had gained a lot of weight, understandably. The two settled across from them, silent. Shin…may have actually been lucky.  
  
Teramoto Ken and his partner, Dorey, walked in holding several manila folders. “Men, women, I thank you for all your service and sacrifice, first and foremost. We’ve dealt a major dent to the Zech’s intentions due to all you’ve done. After I debrief you, you’ll be meeting with General Yoshifumi.”  
  
Oh…wow, the General? Shin frowned as the folders were passed out by Dorey, Teramoto sitting at the head of the table. “You’ve probably followed the news—might have even thought ‘why in the hell did we just move two weeks ago?’.”  
  
“Crossed my mind” Komari said dryly.  
  
“Well, we didn’t. We moved around five days after we recovered you all.”  
  
…Oh. They all looked up, a bit baffled. So…why did it take _two months_? Teramoto cleared his throat, folding his hands, “…Listen to me carefully. I know some of my soldiers at this table aren’t going to take this well.”  
  
Oh God. They were all dead. They couldn’t save any of them. Komari pat his hand under the table, her face stolid. “What occurred, Colonel?”  
  
“Yamada, Yagami, you located ten locations—a majority. However, three of them? Three of them were brand spanking new and weren’t even on our radar yet—there were fifteen that were on our radar. Basically, that leaves eight outstanding. You found seven of the fifteen we were looking for.”  
  
…Shit. Shin swallowed that as Komari looked…aggravated. “With all due respect, Colonel, Yagami and I weren’t _looking_ for anything. We were just trying to get rescued and happened to _find_ those ten along the way. We weren’t on a mission to locate camps. I hope that’s not some knock against us because we didn’t find the eight other camps we didn’t _know existed whatsoever_.”  
  
“Not at all, Yamada” Teramoto assured, “But, having dealt with the Zechs, I think most of us know what that means.”  
  
Ill, Shin squeezed his temples, “…Because you infiltrated the ten we found, they probably have evacuated the other eight.”  
  
“We only can presume. We just can’t wander around there to locate them either though, so, we may have to cut our losses.”

‘Cut our losses’? There were _people there_! Before Shin could protest, Dorey turned on a projector. The pale haired man looked nonplussed as he placed a transparent slip on top of the glass surface. “With the intel you were able to recover, Yamada, Yagami, we were able to retrieve 73 percent of the captives from the infiltrated camps.”  
  
…73 percent? Staring, Shin shivered. He…didn’t want to be the one to ask. It was eating at him and he prayed someone else did. Komari blinked languidly, “…The other 27 percent were casualties, I take it.”  
  
“Unfortunately.”  
  
Fuck. _Fuck_. Komari looked at him softly, murmuring, “Shin, _95 percent_ of our _trained military_ were killed out there. 73 percent isn’t ideal because people died but that’s…that’s pretty _good_. You saw what those people were up against— _we_ were better off than them. I guarantee the Zechs weren’t giving them food nor water.”  
  
“Indeed, Yamada. At least ten percent of that 27 weren’t DOA but the damage done to them was irreparable upon recovery.”  
  
Numbers. They were speaking of people as _numbers_. Koike looked…passive though asked: “…Did you catch any Zechs to charge them for all this?

“The roundup of the Zechs was very impressive” Dorey nodded, “They’re all in prison right now awaiting initial review.”  
  
… “Can we get any of them to flip?” Shin muttered.  
  
Teramoto raised a brow, clicking a pen, “What do you mean?”  
  
“Can we get any of those prisoners to flip on the other eight locations? I understand that they might have been evacuated but there stands a possibility—at the very least, we can collect intel.”  
  
“You volunteering?”  
  
…Was he? Shin’s eyes closed some, leaning back in his chair, “…I guess we should get through this first, sir.”  
  
“Of course. Itoh, Koike, Soga, you have completed your mission. The Army thanks you for your service. Given the nature of your circumstances, we are offering you three the opportunity to end your commission and return to civilian status with veteran benefits. You may also return to service after a mental and physical examination. Should you be found to be unfit, you will be placed in the aforementioned category. At this junction, we would like to offer you the option” Teramoto said, sliding a few pens across the table.  
  
Oh. Koike and Soga took the pens, eagerly signing the paper in the packets with their names printed across them. Shin didn’t need to hear what they chose, the former…was a very sweet deal.   
  
Itoh’s arms were crossed before she sighed, cutting her eyes towards their commanders, “Is there a particular reason you didn’t give options to Yamada or Yagami?”  
  
Oh yea. “Unfortunately, they’re not completely done. We need you both to do press.”  
  
Pardon? “Press?” Komari glared, “You want us to go out and answer a bunch of interview questions? We’re not fucking celebrities.”  
  
Yea, Shin was not trying to be on the firing line of questions about this. Dorey looked aghast, “But you _are_. Please, we have…checks and balances to meet with our coverage of atrocities.”  
  
“I feel you could relate a bit, Yagami. If you weren’t too young to notice, that is” Teramoto said rather absently, staring at the ceiling.  
  
…

Shin sucked his cheek, Komari looking to him questioningly. It was top tier news for a time. Until the coverups. Until it was no longer talked about. Until it was pulled from public information. Until it just didn’t happen. It helped keeping him from finding out. It hurt that a crime that malignant could be swept under the rug.   
  
“…Fine. I’ll do it.”  
  
Komari groaned, rolling her eyes, as Shin waved a hand, “I can do it by myself.”  
  
“No…if you go, I will go” she grumbled.  
  
Kasumi was staring into space. Shin imagined that wasn’t what the woman wanted to hear. However, she picked up the pen, muttering, “…I want to continue in the service. Whatever tests you need done, I’ll do them.”  
  
“Excellent” Teramoto nodded, standing, “Dorey, why don’t you get that worked up while I speak with Yagami and Yamada in the other room?”  
  
“Yes, sir.”  
  
Shin stood, grimacing as Komari wheeled herself back. He took a deep breath as he kept in step beside her. “You really don’t have to, Mari.”  
  
“Am I eager to be a spectacle on live television? Nope. But…well, I guess it’s a part of the journey, right?”  
  
Maybe. Sitting in a smaller room, Teramoto closed the door, sitting. “The General will be here shortly. Both of you? As far as the media needs to be concerned, you two were in a military facility for the last three months and your family was informed in the last few weeks. I wouldn’t expect them to act like they haven’t seen you—really, I’m impressed if they were able to fully carry on the façade this whole time.”  
  
Seriously. Komari nodded, “I’d prefer that. My community would be pissed if I said my dad’s been harboring me for not days but months.”  
  
“Agreed” Shin nodded softly.  
  
“Yagami…are you sticking with us?”  
  
…God. Shin looked up, his throat dry. _Perhaps I spoke too soon._

…But…there were more camps. The…job wasn’t finished. Swallowing, he nodded shortly, “…Yes.”  
  
“You don’t want to discuss this with your family first?”  
  
“No…they’re aware. Anyway, who knows if I’ll pass your testing?”  
  
Teramoto’s brows rose before he rolled his eyes around. “…That would have been for the others, Yagami. We can rehabilitate you.”  
  
… _Oh really_? “…Their accomplishment of surviving isn’t any lesser than ours just because we were crossing the desert, sir. They were taking bullets and out in the elements, just like we were. They can be ‘rehabilitated’ too.”  
  
Komari looked at him absently while Teramoto _shrugged_. “Yagami, I haven’t come close to _anything_ you five have been through. Itoh? Psych test, probably, but she can be rehabilitated too. If the other two had said they wanted to rejoin, probably the same. Your psych test was just now and your over enthusiasm to start flipping POWs for information.”  
  
…Oh. “That…doesn’t make me stable, Teramoto.”  
  
“I should say not, Yagami” Teramoto replied, “But it doesn’t make you broken either.”  
  
Shit. About to remark, he found himself pausing. Wait a minute. “…You’ve mentioned Itoh, Koike, and Soga, Teramoto-san. What about Yamada?”  
  
Komari rubbed her brow, drawling, “Shin…”  
  
He looked to her, baffled, before noting she hadn’t opened her paperwork. Snatching it open, he glanced at the front page. It was _only_ the decommission option. “What is this?”  
  
“Yagami--”  
  
Glaring hard, he waved the papers, “ _What_ is this? Where is Komari’s option to stay in the military? Why does she only get one option?”  
  
Teramoto leered, “Do I have to be terribly insensitive, Yagami, or can you perhaps figure that much out on your own?”  
  
Fuck that. “If Komari is out, _I’m_ out.”  
  
“Shin” she hissed.  
  
“Yagami, not _one_ accolade will be spared for Yamada. She was there with you and we fully recognize that. But you have to fully recognize that now? Now, after that experience, she is handicapped. She is at a disadvantage in a war game that requires _full mobility_. Even with a prosthetic, she will not _have that_.”  
  
Jaw ticking, he glared away. Fuck. Komari reached out and held his hand, giving it a squeeze, “It’s okay, Shin. I have a lot ahead of me too, don’t worry.”  
  
“…Be honest with me, Mari” he whispered, “If I had saved your leg, you got back here in entirely good shape, and we were sitting here with this paperwork and it had all the same options, what would you choose?”  
  
“It’s not the circumstances, Shin--”  
  
“ _If_ , Komari.”  
  
She was annoyed, pulling away and grunting, “If in that now _mythical possibility_? Yes, I would rejoin.”  
  
“…I’ll rejoin on one condition.”  
  
Teramoto groaned, rubbing his face with both hands. “Yagami, you have _conditioned_ me to death, this isn’t a hair salon.”  
  
Komari bit her lip as Shin sulked. “It can all be a wash, sir.”  
  


“What, Yagami?”  
  
“I’ll come back regardless, because that’s…that’s what Yamada wants me to do. _However,_ first, I want you to give her the same rehabilitation treatment I’ll receive on a compliant prosthetic and I want her to be tested at the same level for reevaluation as anyone else in three months. Should she fail that examination, so be it. However, I doubt she will” he said soberly, “Komari is a fighter and a soldier without that leg and I won’t have it determining her capabilities when she was still saving my life after it was gone.”  
  
She looked startled while Teramoto stippled his fingers, staring at them absently, “…It’s too dangerous, Yagami. Something happens to that prosthetic in combat, it’s a liability on us.”  
  
“It’s the same liability if something happens to _my_ leg in battle, sir, I’ve been shot in both pretty severely” Shin countered. “I’m just asking you give her a chance and don’t count her out yet.”  
  
“And…if I refuse?” Teramoto drawled.  
  
Shin also shrugged. “I have other options, Colonel.”  
  
Teramoto gave him a look before his gaze directed to Komari. “…Yamada?”  
  
“…I can’t and won’t guarantee anything, sir, but…I would appreciate the opportunity that Shin laid out, if it were given to me” she murmured.   
  
“…Mm. I see. Well…it’s not the _worst_ ‘condition’ I’ve heard but we’ll have to run it by General Yoshifumi first. You two are an ornery bunch even now, huh?”  
  
Shin smiled some as Komari scoffed, “Duh, General. You ever cross a desert before?”  
  
“Nope…but just know, you two might cross quite a few before all this is over and done with.”  
  
…Strange.  
  
Strange how that plagued him for so many days and nights while he was sitting at home, questioning why he had survived, why he was given the mercy. He continued to feel like a monster, even to this very second, and he…he felt like he’d been lost in that desert for years now. Yet, somehow…he was okay to keep going now, knowing that…the job wasn’t done.   
  
…The right person for the job wouldn’t desire to stay lost nor flee. No, running here wasn’t the option.   
  
…It would only be resolved when he knew, after all the blood and tears, after amending all the suffering, facing the parents of his monsterhood, that he could leave there and never have to return because the work was done.

Okay.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX   
  
_Whoo boy. Maybe he was full of it.  
  
Shin sat on a bench in a long, whitewashed hallways which led to the rooms where he, Itoh, and Komari were staying. After Koike and Soga resigned their military status, they were pretty much just chauffeured back out of here like, well, civilians. Shin saw the peace in their faces though and he was happy for them. There were other ways to help this crazy world aside from this anyway, if they wanted to.  
  
When General Yoshifumi showed up within that hour, Shin almost panicked. This was the general of the ENTIRE army that he was meeting. However, the man that entered the room…was literally like the nicest person he’d ever met in his entire life and he was so confused. The man bowed to them heavily, shaking their hands and giving them the most gracious of compliments. When Shin, confused but resolved, posed the same conditions about Komari to him, the man gushed, “That very much can be arranged, if Yamada-san feels comfortable with that.”  
  
Oh…kay. And, next thing he knew, both he and Komari were tentatively SFC, or, Sergeant First Class. They’d both probably been gaping like idiots in horror. They just skipped like two or three pretty large steps. The General assured that if they could recover and complete recovery of the Prana territory, they would be promoted again and would have his word they’d move into Officer Enlistment meaning…Lieutenant and Colonel status.  
  
As…great as that was, he wasn’t sure he was comfortable just…skipping stages here. Komari had voiced the same when they were sitting outside, a bit alarmed. Like, every level meant something, it wasn’t just like something to vault over. But…okay…he guessed.  
  
Unsurprisingly, they weren’t allowed to contact their parents again because this hadn’t been one long drawn out trauma at all. They were sent to bed at around nine in the evening and to say he was no longer on that schedule was laughable. He hadn’t been on that schedule in the desert, let alone at home when he was so plagued he didn’t fall asleep until nine in the morning some days. Luckily, he had some pills but yeesh.  
  
When he woke up at six, he pulled the formal dress uniform back on and he and Komari were once again driven in a fancy black Lexus to what appeared to be a conference hall. Oh. Right. Questions.  
  
Shin sat beside Komari, already very annoyed because Komari was advised by one of the military women not to ‘say too much’. Um, what? Komari had stared at the advisor before nodding once. Why?? This wasn’t breaking anything down if they complied! But hell, he wished she’d said the same damn thing to him.  
  
“Was the most plausible plan to venture into the desert, unprepared?” asked a perhaps English reporter, the man drab and his face full of what appeared to be judgment.  
  
“Sir, when you’re not expecting to be shot out of the sky on a routine supply run, everything that occurs after, you’re unprepared for” Shin answered dryly, about the tenth question asking in a different way and cadence ‘well, was going into the desert the BEST option?’.  
  
“But military protocol indicates to stay by the wreckage, as should have been reflected in your training.”  
  
Shin found himself daydreaming about if Koji and Nelly were up here. Koji would have jumped over the table they were behind and started punching this man in the throat while Nelly held him down. “Protocol indicates to remain by the wreckage, correct. However, in the event of extenuating circumstances, such as being ambushed by hundreds of enemy soldiers, it can be amended.”  
  
“And you both felt that was an ‘extenuating circumstance’?” asked this man who’d probably never been trapped outside longer than a minute for any reason, disapproving.  
  
“Hey, I got a question: what the fuck?”  
  
Smirking, Shin rubbed his temple as Komari FINALLY grabbed the mic. Oops, he did have a ‘Koji’ up here. Komari’s brow was pulsing as she glared. The reporter looked disgusted, “YOU’RE supposed to answer the questions, if that hasn’t been clear.”  
  
“I’ll do what the fuck I want and hearing fucking stupid as shit questions is getting me fucking pissed. ‘Oh no, was your circumstances so bad that you broke protocol?’. Stupid ass BITCH, only FIVE OF US LIVED. The majority of THREE only survived because two of us LEFT. Yes, you dumb FUCK, it was an EXTENUATING CIRCUMSTANCE.”  
  
The man was gawking now as Shin smiled awkwardly, “Um…next question?”  
  
The one that stood next looked like an American fellow, like one of those old Texan men with an oil company. He also seemed dismayed. “Now, what would you all say to those that are irate that you all didn’t break in and free those Terrans in the camps, taking them with you?”  
  
Shin took a deep breath. Oh. Komari was nonplussed, “Pay very close attention because this might go over your head: the desert is hot. HOT. You require WATER to stay alive in heat especially. We start a great exodus? You would need WATER AND SUPPLIES. Not to mention, the times that the Zechs just showed up? Well, guess what you have to do with a GROUP of nonarmed people? Protect them. And a crowd draws attention. And us stealing the reason they’re out there would have definitely drawn attention. What we chose, while it bothered us to our core, was the best way for us to get them out of there, if we were to be found.”  
  
“And if you weren’t found?”  
  
“We merely expedited this process. Our army seemed very aware that there were camps in Prana” Shin answered.  
  
“Well, perhaps…” the man scoffed, “If you’d had taken another soldier with you, you would have been more prepared to help those people then and there.”  
  
Now Shin was imagining HIMSELF jumping over this table and punching this man in the throat. Sitting up straighter, Shin folded his hands. “…I refuse to speak ill of the dead. Our group of a hundred shouldn’t have been decimated. Not for…the Zech’s atrocities which I’m feeling more and more is getting validated in this room as their ‘right’. But I’ll say this: the only reason ALL of us aren’t dead is because Yamada had my back. There was no other soldier I would have selected before her and that’s not up to question. We’re sitting right here. We made it.”  
  
“And those that would say women shouldn’t be in active duty for the very reason that they wouldn’t be as efficient?” asked, SURPRISINGLY, a blonde woman snidely.  
  
Komari stared apathetically as Shin smiled, clearing his throat. “In the spirit of my brothers and my best friend here…fuck them. They can go choke on a dick. Next question, please.”  
  
“Well, it wasn’t the most…eloquent of meetings but you two haven’t been trained to be PR agents.”  
  
After getting lambasted and flaming the living hell out of each other, the press conference came to a close and Shin was so on edge, he was teetering over. Komari had covered her face with her hands, seething. Teramoto had dismissed the reporters, now only the three of them in the room. Tapping his fingertips against the table erratically, Shin hissed, “…Am I to understand we’re getting looked at as villains?”  
  
How? There wasn’t one question that wasn’t ridiculing. Not one. His jaw grew taut as he snarled, “It was…120 plus degrees in that desert, Teramoto. We were walking on FIRE. Our bodies were having the water…vaporized out of them. We had no food—we had to KILL people. I didn’t want a medal—I don’t even want PRAISE, but I didn’t expect to hear how much BETTER we could have done.”  
  
Komari dropped her hands, revealing her somewhat damp eyes. “…Forgive me if tears of rage seem particularly effeminate and unbecoming of the man’s Army.”  
  
Shin rubbed her shoulder silently as Teramoto SHRUGGED. Oh, good, SHRUG. “You’re going to always have detractors, you two. People that tell you how they would have done something when they haven’t had to do anything even close once in their life nor will they, most likely. Don’t let them get to you when the heat and Zechs didn’t. They’re dumbasses.”  
  
…Ugh. Easier said than done. “Ready for round two?”  
  
Shit.  
  
Alas, with the second round of reporters, it seemed a lot less…biased, like these people weren’t secretly supporting genocidal maniacs. They asked general questions and about the experience. There was a Terran reporter that seemed a BIT up in arms though. They admitted they understood the methods he and Komari took but that they wished it were different. No, Shin agreed a hundred plus percent to that…  
  
“Yagami.”  
  
After the third and last meeting with the press, Shin found himself sitting outside of the room on a bench, mentally…destroyed and drained. He wanted to go home. He…he finally wanted to just go home. The world was just as jacked up as his mind but at least he knew what he was dealing with there.  
  
He looked up, startled, by the voice. It wasn’t one that typically addressed him, at least, not for anything good. Itoh Kasumi appeared, wearing the same dress uniform except with a skirt, her long hair tucked in a bun underneath her cover. She stared at him heavily before slowly sitting on the opposite end of the bench. Well, now he was scared.  
  
“…Itoh?”  
  
Kasumi glared in front of her, her hands rested in her lap. “…I will never think it’s necessary, nor appropriate, that Komari has a male friend. Especially one that she is so…taken with.”  
  
Okay… Kasumi muttered, “I tried everything. Everything. But you’re unmovable in her sight. I tried to muddy your presence and instead only sullied my own. She told me I can go once this is over and she meant it. So, I suppose you can have her.”  
  
“…I have a girl. A girl I turned my back on because of things I don’t understand. But she…is everything to me and, if she’ll have me, I want to be her husband. That isn’t Komari. I care deeply for the woman you love, Kasumi, she is irreplaceable to me. But she’s not my girl and she won’t ever be. And Komari is well aware of that. She has a girl too that needs to come to an understanding.”  
  
Silent, Kasumi finally scoffed, “…You’ll excuse me if I don’t believe you’re choosing anyone over Komari.”  
  
Shin smiled at that. “You love her and place her highly. I do too. It’s just on a different kind of shelf, one where you don’t have to worry about me coming to move her.”  
  
“…Even if your girl doesn’t choose you?”  
  
If Lyla didn’t want him… “If Lyla doesn’t want me…I don’t know if I’d bother with anyone again.”  
  
Kasumi pursed her lips, sitting up straighter, “…I don’t know what it is that happened in the desert, only that Komari came back with a severe injury that has left her without a limb.”  
  
Grimacing, Shin nodded slowly. Kasumi quietly patted her knee, her face scrunching, “…But…she told me you put a lot of effort into making sure she got back alive at all. And she mentioned that you…spoke up to keep her from getting dismissed from the army and stuck up for her during the interviews when they insinuated her gender kept her from performing highly. It’s too affectionate and suspicious.”  
  
He wanted to fall over. Full DAMN CIRCLE. Rubbing his temples, feeling a furious migraine, he droned, “Itoh…”  
  
“Shut up” she huffed, “…If you mean…what it is you say—and it’s Komari that has the utmost trust in you, not me-- but…what you said back in the barrack was true. Love and mistrust aren’t a combination for success and…if she trusts you, I will attempt to as well. And I…thank you for being able to help her get back alive.”  
  
Oh. “…Gladly.”  
  
“Kasumi, I SWEAR TO GOD--”  
  
They both jumped as Komari wheeled herself from another room, still looking peaked from the interviews. “Ah, Komari--” blurted Shin.  
  
“If you’re giving him shit, Kasumi—I promise, I am NOT in the mood right now” Komari snapped.  
  
Kasumi glowered and Shin smiled, waving his hands, “N-No, no, Komari. We were having a decent conversation, try not to mess that up, please.”  
  
Komari gave him a look of disbelief and he nodded to confirm. Kasumi huffed, looking away. Jeez…they needed…a lot of help. But, well…there was no denying there was something there. Standing, he patted Komari’s shoulder, “You two should talk. I’m going to bed before my head explodes.”  
  
“…Thanks, Shin.”  
  
…Well, now that that maybe was resolved, what…about his own predicament? What…what was keeping Lyla trapped?  
  
_“Huh. You’re pretty good on that.”  
  
“Hmm, I cheated a bit.”  
  
Yagami Shin strode behind one of the captains commanding the POW jail, a crazy a situation as any. He didn’t have time to think about _anything_. After the interviews, they had to talk to newspapers, news stations, magazines—he hadn’t spoken to his family in a week and a half and that was ridiculous. This…was going to possibly take up his life like this, wasn’t it?  
  
Well, he thought once all the propaganda fodder was done, they’d send them home. Nope, time for Phase 1. They took them to see the Zechian soldiers, the ones that, four plus months ago, were trying to kill them in the desert. Teramoto nodded, “ _You said you’d flip them. Flip them.”  
  
_ He meant…hypothetically. He didn’t know how to interrogate or break anyone, he’d only been in the army for three years, damn. Komari walked beside him, wearing a prosthetic the army provided her. They had looked amazed when she moved rather fluidly before whispering that maybe ‘Yagami wasn’t wrong’. Nope. But just…cheated a bit.  
  
“This one’s name is Alfred” announced the captain, stopping outside of a door with a one-sided window.   
  
Shin peered in, finding a maybe thirty year old man with brown hair and blank eyes on the other side wearing an orange jumper, his hands handcuffed to the table. “…He has information?”  
  
“Per all the other soldiers that flipped the second we got them here, he has the _most_ information. He just won’t break down and say anything.”  
  
…Okay. The captain gave them the keys and a few files. “I’ll take my leave. Short of outright murder, the sky is the limit. Good job to both of you and good luck.”  
  
Oh really? Komari nodded as the man left, leaning against a table. Flipping open the manila folder, Shin absently read the contents. “Alfred Cranston. Age: 39. Oh, former M16.”  
  
“Great, so he’s James Bond” Komari snorted sarcastically, reading the same data in her copy.  
  
“Closer than you think too. No family. Parents were killed in an accident…spent time in Desert Storm. No jail time…he’s a tough case.”  
  
Komari yawned, setting the file down, before tapping her fist against her open palm, “Well, in that case, only one thing to do…”  
  
“Stop it” he snickered, “We’ve been given full impunity to levy with him. Let’s fly him back to the U.K.”  
  
“I beg the hell your pardon? This dude is out killing people and you want to just send him home if he gives us information?” Komari demanded.  
  
Shrugging, Shin tucked the file under his arm, “We inform M16 and they formally charge him there for war crimes. He’s off our books and he’s looking at fifty years in the slammer with what we do have of his records.”  
  
“…It’s a hard move” Komari muttered, “He should see judicial justice _here_.”  
  
“He should see justice in the _Middle East_ where he committed these crimes. Which is another offer on the table, if you catch my drift” Shin murmured, going to the door.  
  
“…Ah, gotcha. If it doesn’t work, beating is Option C, right?”  
  
Shin smirked, opening the door, “Sure.”  
  
“I already told you assholes to go fuck yourselves, yea?” snarled the bastard without preamble.  
  
“My guy, you’re the only one that fucked themselves in this room” Komari retorted wryly.   
  
The fellow gritted his teeth as they took the seats across from him. “You’re a bunch of desperate _chinks_. Sending kids in here to beg and plead. Go back to the hole you crawled out of, yea?”  
  
“The _fuck_ did you just call us?” Komari demanded, slamming her fist down on the table _hard_.

“A _chink_ , you butch dyke--”  
  
Shin clamped his hand over the man’s mouth hard, shoving his head back. The garbage looked shocked as, like his starting declaration, the act came with no introduction. Gripping hard and squeezing his face, Shin stared at him evenly. “You’ll stop your usage of that word now and cease insulting my partner here immediately before I suffocate the life out of your miserable body. Are we understanding or do you want to see what I’m capable of after slaughtering hundreds of your bastard friends?”  
  
While he hoped Komari picked up to play _good cop_ , she actually flipped open a switchblade, “The latter option is _gladly_ on the table, motherfucker.”  
  
He glared. M16 trained, he wasn’t going to be easily intimidated but he nodded. Of course, the second Shin moved his hand, the miscreant spat at them. Oddly, reflex alone? Well, reflexively, Shin punched him so hard between the eyes, he scared himself.  
  
The man howled, screaming, “You bastard!! You bastard!!”  
  
“Shut the fuck up” Komari snapped, grabbing his hair and slamming him cheek down into the table, “We’re not fucking playing with you. We don’t even have to enter records we ever picked your miserable ass up, we can make you _disappear_ from this _room_. Where are the other camps?”  
  
“Fuck you!!”  
  
Shin was already angry. “What do you want to happen here, Cranston?”  
  
“For you fuckers to go to hell” he sneered.  
  
Woah boy. “Okay, we go to hell. What happens to your ass beside coming with us?”  
  
He grunted, turning his nose up. Shin leaned back, folding his hands, “All right, let me tell you what happens at this junction. You’re wanted on two hundred counts of kidnapping, armed battery, homicide, and the war crime of genocide against a nonhostile population. You are currently sitting in a country that will not hold your trial—we will return you to Iraq where you’ll be tried by the Terran Tribune.”  
  
“Those pussies won’t do anything.”  
  
Komari glanced at the file, rubbing her face, “Actually, they want to set you on fire in the square until you expire, citing it is the crime you committed against several of their high clergy.”  
  
“Barbarians” Cranston muttered.  
  
“I’m sorry…did you not hear that part where they want to do what _you did_ to others?” Shin questioned sardonically, “They’re barbarians but you’re just pure and justified, right?”  
  
“They’re responsible for more suffering than you bleeding hearts are capable of accepting.”  
  
With a short laugh, Komari picked up her knife, “I dunno about that. I do know you bastards tried to kill me and my buddy here quite a few times and you severed eyeballs, fingers, toes, and hands to torture people so you’re setting the bar pretty fucking high.”  
  
“Tell us where the camps are, we return you to the United Kingdom. They probably won’t execute you” Shin proposed.  
  
“My previous answer still stands: go fuck yourselves.”  
  
Shin leaned back, sucking his teeth, staring at this fellow who was unwavering. “…Strange. You’re a parentless ex-M16 agent that doesn’t want to go home. What’s your secret?”  
  
“I have no home.”  
  
“Maybe he is James Bond” Komari said sarcastically.  
  
No…Shin continued to gaze at the man’s unwavering face. Something came to mind. A story he thought he’d heard his father say from afar to his mother. Something about how every person had their weakness and monsters used it to their advantage.  
  
…Was it okay if they were both monsters though?  
  
“…Yamada, a moment.”  
  
She gave him a short glance but nodded once, standing and walking with him out of the room. “…I want to get Teramoto and I want him to give clearance to a guy. You’ve spoken to him before but he’s able to piece things together fairly quickly. I think we can get him to flip willingly.”  
  
“A stab in the face is just as quick” Komari drawled.  
  
“Nah…he’s hardened. It’s like stabbing us in the face to get answers, we’d just double down even harder. No, I think I have an angle.”  
  
Komari raised a brow as they walked to find Teramoto, her hands in her camo pockets, “What angle do you think we have against a monster like that, Shin?”  
  
“…You ever seen Scooby Doo? It’s an American cartoon.”  
  
“You’re not the American Whisperer, asshole, I know Scooby Doo” she smirked.  
  
“Of course” he winked, “…You ever get the underlying message?”  
  
“They’re all potheads?”  
  
“No-o-o. Scooby and Shaggy, they believed every time that whomever they ran into, they were ghosts and monsters. But every time, they ended up finding out underneath that mask was a human being. End of the day, you, me, Cranston…there’s a human being under that mask.”  
  
With a snort, Komari shook her head, “If we’re going to dig for that man’s humanity to make an appeal, Yagami, we might as well just let the Terran’s burn him up. It’ll be quicker.”  
  
“End goal.”  
  
“…End goal is the information” she muttered grouchily, “Just wished it wasn’t coming from this piece of shit. But you really think your guy can figure it out?”  
  
“Hmm…he’s shown me he can figure out a lot of things.”  
  
Hell, after this…maybe he could help him figure _her_ out.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _“Yagami-san, you can tell me: what REALLY happened?”  
  
Torataro Louis was staring, wide-eyed, at him as they sat in a room with a computer the size of a truck. Shin was sitting across from him, Komari’s legs propped up on the table. The woman blinked at Louis for a second before looking to Shin, “…He looks like the Super Nerds from Pokemon.”  
  
“Komari” Shin smirked, cutting his eyes at her, “Louis…let me tell you, man, it sounds crazy. It was crazy. But Komari and I crossed the desert and lived. We…uncovered the other thing we were telling you about before we left: the Zechs were trying to throw us off. They were in that area of the desert called Prana, not in Fenith.”  
  
Louis brows furrowed as he crossed his arms, staring Shin and Komari over, “…But statistically, it’d be IMPOSSIBLE. It’s one of the hottest deserts on the planet!”  
  
While Shin wanted to ask why Louis thought he’d lie about such an experience, he was honestly flabbergasted when Komari snatched up her pant’s leg, showing off her false leg. “You want me to take off this IMPOSSIBLE leg I got because I was out in that desert to beat you with it?”  
  
“…Just so special” Shin groaned.  
  
Backpedaling, Louis blurted, “N-No, no, tha-that’s okay. I believe you, just…that’s so…so incredible! Superhuman, even!”  
  
Yea… “Louis, I need your help. I know you’re a scientist but I think…no, I believe you can get me some intel. I got you military clearance to help us find information on Alfred Cranston.”  
  
Louis frowned, looking up thoughtfully, “…Cranston. Cranston…”  
  
After a moment, he snapped his fingers, “He was in Desert Storm with Brent Drake!”  
  
Who? Both Shin’s and Komari’s brows furrowed as Louis went to work, typing on the computer. “His father, Bernard Drake, is credited with starting the Zechs’ Initiative. Brent Drake, his only son, was said to have been killed by a Terran enemy…there was no particular PROOF he was killed by a Terran except his good friend, Alfred Cranston, said he was.”  
  
…WHAT? Komari looked startled, “…So…?”  
  
“Hmm, from what I was able to piece together from information I…obtained, it wasn’t an enemy soldier at all. The bullet wounds from the autopsy weren’t congruent with the weapons the Iraqi soldiers were using at all. In fact, it wasn’t the weapons the other side were using either.”  
  
What? Louis nodded, “It was a special weapon. Only certain agencies had access to it.”  
  
Komari stared before looking to Shin, her eyes narrowing, “…That our weakness, Yagami?”  
  
“It’s…a good excuse for a hanging” Shin said lowly, his chest clenching, “Anything on Cranston would be helpful, Louis. Deep interpersonal stuff. Family, friends, lovers…we need to get something important out of him.”  
  
Louis blinked at him. “…You sound a bit corrupted now, Yagami-san.”  
  
“I know. Just…don’t think the cause can afford for me not to be a bit corrupted. I understand if you don’t want to assist if you feel it’s wrong.”  
  
“Oh, absolutely not, I completely want to!” Louis insisted, “Just glad you have a scope on it. I…I don’t think others do.”  
  
Nope. The…okay one for the job. ‘Right’ wasn’t appropriate. None of it was ‘right’. He was preparing to blackmail a man to get to where his cohorts were keeping thousands of innocent people prisoner. It was messy and he hated it.  
  
They…were the ones okay enough to get this job done, hopefully.  
  
_“Well, well, if it isn’t the halfbreed and his wench?”  
  
Shin entered the room quietly, Komari coming behind him, holding a boxy chunky phone. They sat across from Cranston, staring at him emptily. It’d been a day. A day too short in Shin’s book. Alfred Cranston stared at them, smirking, his fingers crossed. “I figured it was strange to have a blue-eyed Jap. Must have been some American quim or randy gent that got their rocks off in one of you orients.”  
  
“How in the _fuck_ do you manage to be that fucking _racist_?” Komari leered incredulously, “Is that some class major they have in M16 or did you find yourself in the skinheads, ya’ flaccid dick for brains?”  
  
Alfred snorted, “Why don’t you check how _flaccid_ it can be or would actually seeing a dick change your ways?”  
  
“Oh, yes, Mister Terrorist Man, perhaps your penis would save me from the sinful wiles of lesbianism” Komari sang, swooning, before she leaned back, her eyes narrowing as she droned, “And me without my magnifying glass.”  
  
Shin smiled as Alfred opened his mouth to probably continue this tit for tat. Nope. They had work to do. “Mr. Cranston, you’re not _entirely_ ignorant. You know this can only go but so many ways for you. All we want is information and, perhaps, it can go the less painful way.”  
  
“You can leave, hybrid. The girl is the only one that can get fucked in this situation.”  
  
“We’ll send you back to England then” Shin replied, “You’ll be prosecuted for war crimes and, most likely sentenced to spend the rest of your life in an isolated prison. A good deal for someone that doesn’t deserve it.”  
  
“Whatever floats your boat” Alfred drawled.  
  
Shin tapped his cheek, musing, “Of course, it just wouldn’t be quite appropriate if we just sent you back without speaking to your nan, right?”  
  
Alfred stared as Komari held up the phone on speaker. After a few rings, a sweet elderly voice came on the line, “Hello?”  
  
Good ol’ Louis. Shin watched as the color drenched from Alfred’s face. Komari smiled, “Hello? Is this Agnes Cranston?”  
  
“It is. May I ask who’s calling?”  
  
Alfred slammed his fingers down against the table, rapidly shaking his head. Shin stared at him evenly, “End the call, Komari. Tell her we’re going to send her flowers.”  
  
“Ah, Mrs. Cranston, I’m a part of a group that seeks to recognize missing soldier’s relatives. We heard about your grandson, Alfred, and we wanted to send you flowers and cakes. You still live on 40 Blenheim Road in Sutton, England?”  
  
“Oh, that’s so kind of you. Yes, that is my address. It’s been so difficult since Alfie went missing.”  
  
“I can imagine, ma’am. Chin up, we’ll watch out for you.”  
  
“Thank you so much. Ta.”  
  
“Ta.”  
  
Alfred was shaking as Komari looked at her nails, Shin staring at him evenly. “If-If you bastards do anything to my nan--”  
  
“No, no. That’s…that’s the kind of shit _you_ would do, ‘Alfie’” Shin assured, waving his hands, “Despite the fact she managed to raise a despicable piece of garbage like you, I’m not sure that was her fault. She did the very best she could with you, the one that was recklessly breaking and entering and beating and robbing her elderly neighbors while she worked to put a roof over your head. Why, everyone in the family told her she was _crazy_ for adopting her ‘rebellious grandson’ but good ol’ nan made sure her _Alfie_ stayed out of the orphanage.”  
  
“And she’s so _proud_ of her dear ‘Alfie’ getting inducted into the prestigious M16. However, she seems quite unaware that you were dishonorably removed from service for…what was it, Shin?” Komari questioned airily.  
  
Shin nodded, opening the file, “Ah, yes, _treason,_ Komari. Selling M16 secrets to your former ‘best friend’s’ father and anyone that paid enough.”  
  
“Oh, by God, it would break poor nan’s _heart_ to hear her beloved _Alfie_ was out there killing and murdering and betraying Queen and country!” gasped Komari.  
  
“Yes, just…imagine when M16 puts it out all over television and paper that Alfred was wrangled _and_ entangled in a genocidal terrorist group that has murdered over three thousand good British soldiers and women, if nothing else. Oh, all those relatives that said she was wasting her time, why, they’ll worry her into the grave early” Shin shook his head.  
  
Alfred’s jaw was ticking rapidly. Shin suspected. “D-Do it then! I don’t care about that crone!”  
  
“I figured it’d come to that” Komari yawned.  
  
“Yes, I figured he’d overlook the crimes and potential beatings she might receive for having such a vile grandson. But strangely one that sent her checks up until last month in the guise of M16 beneficiary pay. Why, she just might lose that house he’s been paying for for no good reason.”  
  
“…W-What does it matter? You already said you’re telling M16, all of this would happen whether I provided you information or not!”  
  
Shaking his head, Shin held up his hand, “…Tell us all you know, Mr. Cranston, and M16 will take you and indict you under a false name. A POW account. To your dear nan, you were merely a casualty on the field. M16 will continue to fund her and she will never know what befell her rotten grandson.”  
  
“Why would I even begin to trust that?” Cranston spat.  
  
“Because we like your nan and we hate you” Komari said shortly. “Even if you do take the shitty grandson route, we’ll take care of her. Remove her in her last days from the only home she knows to keep her in a safehouse here in Japan, a country she knows nothing about. She’ll be cut off from the outside, knowing her grandson was a mass murdering piece of shit. We’ll tell her it wasn’t her fault though. It’s all we can do, after all. But it’s more than what you give her.”  
  
“…Fuckers.”  
  
Shin had to hide his childish delight as the man unfolded the locations of several camps. Not only that, he told them where some of them had been relocated and where new centers were being founded. Giving all the schematics to the bases, he snarled, red-faced. “Now you slanty-eyed bastards keep your word about my nan.”  
  
“You nan will live freely as she had with no inclination that you’re a terrorist spy and you will go into M16 history as a John Smith…AFTER the information checks out” Shin replied.  
  
“That wasn’t the agreement!!” Cranston snapped.  
  
Slowly, Komari slid the paper he’d written his info on back across the table to him. “Why the fuck would we honor an agreement made with bullshit information? Here’s your chance to fix it, bitch. Once we leave this room and anything comes up false or completely untrue, our terms cease to exist.”  
  
Alfred slowly took the papers back and…rewrote them. Wow, he really thought, huh? Snatching the papers up, Komari huffed, flipping Cranston off, and left the room. Shin stood, folding his hands behind his back as Alfred glared at him hatefully. Hmm. Shin may have understood something about Lyla’s situation now because of this.  
  
“…You know what else I might pull out of the woodwork on you, Cranston, after your nan peacefully passes living her life freely without your stigma?” Shin questioned. “Three specialized bullets to the back. Brent Drake took…three specialized bullets to the back. A specialized gun only gifted to M16 agents in the late eighties that completed training.”  
  
Alfred stared quietly as Shin leaned over, his eyes closing some, “I believe Mr. Drake was attempting to…assist Terrans that were being harmed by some of your current Zechian cronies and got murdered for it. You pinned the blame on Terrans and got his father gung-ho enough to fund this initiative. Really, all you wanted was to get access to their technology. Imagine…if one day, I just slid him the pictures of his son’s autopsy with those special bullet holes in his back. And, because I’m _sure_ you covered every dark base, that the gun could only be accessed in a specific manner. Weird…weapon to choose, Alfred. Forensics could take you to town.”  
  
“…No one’s looked yet.”  
  
“But they will. Because, as far as this…entire battle goes, one that almost had me killed and has played ‘fuck up’ with my psyche, you were ground zero. For nan’s sake, and until I have the opportunity to have Bernard Drake sitting in this room to tell him his genocidal mania is without purpose but caused by someone he kept at his right hand, Mr. Smith, you get to live. For now.”  
  
Walking out of the room before the parasite could respond, Shin glowered. It didn’t sit well. At all. That man… _started this_.   
  
…Well, maybe it was okay. He…wanted to at least be one of the people that was going to end it.

 _“So…let me understand.”  
  
Shin smiled grimly as he stood by the phone, the receiver pressed to his ear, preparing to do…the unthinkable. Yes…he was about to get on a plane, fly back to Prana, and…oversee to an extent, this mission.   
  
First off, he hadn’t come home in almost a month which was…well, it was pretty much peak level insanity after being forced into isolation for two months after being lost in the desert two months. This was…probably his third call which was also not great. Now, he was not at home, on his third call this month, advising his family he was…going back to where he almost died.  
  
Yea, his dad SAID he knew Shin was interested in continuing this line of work. There was, nonetheless, kind of a difference between ‘easing’ and ‘catapulting’. Shin was doing the latter. The man had voiced that one line as Shin explained this to his family from afar…and failed to say anything else. There was dead silence on the other end.  
  
“Shin…” Nelly said after some moments, “…If you go missing this time, I won’t even cry. I’ll just say ‘what a crazy fuck’.”  
  
“Nelly” Dana reprimanded.  
  
“Shin, I made all the siblings aware that you probably would…continue on your journey to making the world a better place. While you had some naysayers, I got most everyone on board” Koji explained, “…However, we weren’t thinking it would be within a month, bro, not gonna lie.”  
  
Tony scoffed, “Seriously! Did they even, like, test you?! Are you even ready to go run around and start this shit over again?!”  
  
Shin sighed, looking back as people started to head out. Boy, he picked a great time to have this conversation, he left in literally ten minutes. “I am a strategist on this one, guys. Both Komari and I are just helping with information and navigation. We will not be engaging in combat, we’ll be sitting in a base. We will have soldiers guarding us because, yes, we are out of shape and not very sharp right now. We found the other camps…and we want to get to them before they get shut down. I swear, I will be home soon--”  
  
“Déjà vu…” Koji sang.  
  
“Shaddup, Koji. I am COMING home, no ifs, ands, or buts. Just…make sure to check up on Lyla for me, please?”  
  
“…Okay, nii-san” Jill mumbled. “Please, please, please be safe.”  
  
“I will, imoto.”  
  
Yamada and Dana were dead silent. Their son literally was able to surpass dying in one of the most fatal situations imaginable and he just…decided to head right on back, yep. Swallowing, he murmured, “Mama, papa, I know you both are very realistic. Even with mama’s faith in me coming home…you know the deal. However, I’m asking you to have faith that this Shin will always have the intentions of getting home because…because this isn’t over yet. I have too much to do.”  
  
“…I guess that was what went wrong” mumbled Yamada.  
  
Yea…that guy? The one he was named after? He had nothing he seemed to have been working for. JUST staying alive. That…wasn’t always enough. Sometimes more was too much but…Shin was balanced right now. He was ready to set these wheels in motion.  
  
“Yo, Shin, we gotta go!” Komari called, heading for the door.  
  
“All right. I’ll call you guys when I get to base and then I’ll call you once it’s over. Believe in me.”  
  
“You got this, nii-san” Shaun said confidently.  
  
“…Oh…” Dana whined.  
  
Shin smiled, “I love all of you. See you soon.”  
  
Hanging up before they started to yell some more, Shin rushed off after Komari, picking up his knapsack. They saluted them as they entered the plane and he just…saluted back. He didn’t feel he’d earned seniority at all yet. But…in time.  
  
“…Man. I didn’t think I’d get to ask you this again!!” Komari yelled as the helicopter lifted into the sky, staring out of the window.  
  
“What’s that?!” he tilted his head, puzzled.   
  
“Ready to go fuck em up?!”  
  
He snickered, “…Yea. Let’s do it.”  
  
_XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
December 10th, 2002.  
  
 _“Why is he here?!”  
  
_ “Because he needs to relax too!”  
  
The last thing in any version of the universe Yagami Shin wanted to be in…was a hot damn box. It felt like he was _choosing_ to go to Hell for kicks and giggles. Glowering as he sat across from Komari and Kasumi, he shook his head. “…I think I’m with Itoh on this one, Yamada, even if the reasoning is different.”  
  
He fanned himself, shaking his head, as they sat in a bathhouse sauna combination. The heat was _pressing his face_. It was almost enough to give him flashbacks except they were all wearing towels, Komari was dumping water on coals to create more steam, and they were drinking sake. Yea, still not quite dying in the desert.  
  
“You have been hyped up to the _gods_ since we got here, Yagami, you need to calm the fuck down” grunted Komari, pointing the ladle at him.  
  
“Because I want to go home, Komari. I am _not_ spending a third Christmas away from my people” Shin scoffed.  
  
When they landed two weeks ago, everything was already rolling. The army was prepared to depart and recover. He and Komari advised what the bases looked like, what Cranston had told them the layout was, and what to expect. Simple enough…except he might have overestimated the promises made to his family.  
  
He thought they were going to only be on the base, but one day, they were on the field casually…when the Zechs ran at them and essentially were ready to kill them. Shin could say, without a doubt, he was about, mm, eight percent stable? Because he went postal. He felt better because Komari and Kasumi _also_ went postal but it just proved that they were…not a hundred percent at all in any respect, no. Teramoto rushed them back to base and insisted they just work remotely from there. _“I mean…you all shot accurately but you are not entirely authorized to do so. Be our weapons here. We’re…we’re getting people back because of the work you’ve done.”_  
  
The recovery percentage decreased. At first he was devastated but…he had to realize it’d decrease because they were finding these people months after the fact. They were finding a lot of people alive though and he was…pleased. Now, just to make sure they…stayed that way.  
  
Komari sighed airily, her hair damp and coiling in the steam, “I get ya’, bro. I would like to spend Christmas in Tsuyukasa with my parents and my lady here.”  
  
Kasumi nodded solemnly as Komari played with the woman’s long hair. Yea, he got the idea Kasumi meant a few different things with ‘why was he here?’. Before he could casually exit, Komari suddenly scoffed, “I am so pissed over Sato’s…ballsyness—asshattery? That’s your brothers’ words, right? Asshattery?”  
  
“It is” Shin chuckled.  
  
“Well, asshattery then.”  
  
After a long day, Shin, Komari, and Kasumi returned from the communications room they were operating out of to get some shut eye only to have Teramoto greet them, clearly annoyed. _“…Yagami, I’m sorry and I apologize, but you have some charges to answer for officially. Put on your dress uniform.”  
  
_ He was…so, so, _so_ shocked. Komari went ballistic. _“Charges, Teramoto? Like, criminal charges?! You can send us the fuck home right now!”  
  
“Relax, Yamada. C’mon, Yagami…and you can come too, Yamada, but stay quiet. These aren’t levied against you but you can witness.”  
  
_Shin managed to dress after throwing up in panic. That sort of thing was not a great feeling after _all this_. What on Earth could he have done to have to be court-martialed _right now_?  
  
When he arrived at the designated room and saw former Lieutenant Sato, he felt his face just melt into ‘are you fucking serious right now?’.   
  
Two other people were in the room, a man and woman. The man was dressed up in the same uniform as they were, looking deadpanned while the woman was trembling. Who even were these people? Komari glared hotly at Sato who just stared emptily at them back. What even was this aside from some bull? Sitting next to Teramoto on the opposite side of the table, a general at the head, Shin waited with…curious breath what the man wanted to get him written up on NOW?  
  
 _“Sergeant Yagami Shin, I would like you to meet Colonel Kitamura Yuuto and his wife, Kitamura Sana”_ the general introduced.  
  
…Oh. Kitamura’s parents.   
  
Before he could give them his condolences, Sato jumped _right in_. _“I’ve advised Daisuke’s parents that I feel the circumstances of the plane crash and their son’s subsequent death are questionable, at best.”  
  
_ Really. Shin blinked at him. _“What about the circumstances are questionable?”  
  
“How it is only you, Yamada, and three other soldiers were able to make it out of this heinous situation alive? Forty percent of the surviving five had active problems with Kitamura here at base.”  
  
_He had never in his life in such a short span of time wanted to jump across the table and pummel so many people. First it was the interviewers, then it was Cranston, and now it was _fucking Sato_. Shin tried to keep composed but he had to rub his head, a migraine just slapped him in the brain hard. _“…Are you trying to implicate that I perhaps…caused Kitamura’s death?”  
  
“Did you?”  
  
“Boy, I should not have been let into this meeting” _Komari had hissed under her breath. _  
  
_Shin had taken a deep breath and looked to the parents. The father looked suspicious because Sato had probably been feeding him this for months. The mother…well, she probably just wanted her son back. _“Kitamura-san, the last time I saw your son alive, he was designating me water to take out to the desert. When I walked away from our camp, he was very much alive and keeping our army very much alive. We did have our disagreements here at base but we came to a mutual agreement out there. He did not withhold water nor sustenance from me and my full intention was to get help back to our camp so he could come home. I did not bring any harm to Kitamura.”  
  
“The bias is incredible at best_” Sato charged gravely, _“Everyone that lived would be forever in Yagami’s graces for bringing help back to rescue them. They would not tell the truth.”  
  
_ Boy, was it like a very dubious play…but he shook his head. _“Ask Itoh.”  
  
_ Even _Komari_ stared at him in horror with this remark. Yea, Kasumi might have given him that begrudging heart to heart back in Japan but that didn’t mean she wouldn’t flip. However, a soldier was sent to retrieve Kasumi who appeared, looking confused. Sato glared, _“…As I said, anyone that bore witness would feel beholden to Yagami Shin for retrieving help for them.”  
  
“Itoh wouldn’t” _Shin countered.  
  
Komari smiled nervously, kneading her fingers, as Kasumi sat beside her. Oh boy. Kasumi had been updated and advised of the charge. Really, hearing it laid out, he felt like he had definitely made a stupid move. She wouldn’t have to worry about him taking Komari while he was in prison for _treason_. The broody woman stared at them, her green eyes heavy before she cleared her throat.  
  
 _“…I do not care for Yagami much. For personal reasons, I assure you. However…what you’re charging him with does not even make any plausible sense. That we’re sitting here to even discuss it is damning because it shows the ignorance in this room.”  
  
_ Oops, Komari Jr. Sato hissed, _“I beg your pardon?”  
  
“Yagami would have had to shoot Kitamura amongst dozens of our fellow soldiers. Seventy soldiers would not have stood for this. They would have shot him down and that would have been the end of it.”  
  
“Nothing to say he didn’t kill all of them with Yamada if they were capable of trekking across thousands of miles of enemy territory” _Sato had proclaimed, looking to the Kitamura _.  
  
“Oh my God, oh my God” _Komari said, her voice actually excited. She even started hitting his arm while Shin just squeezed the bridge of his nose, in…genuine and the utmost disbelief _, “Am I being charged now? Can I say something now??”  
  
“NO” _Teramoto interjected quickly.  
 _  
_Kasumi rolled her eyes, _“If you mean to proclaim me a liar, we’ll need to do it in something higher than this…little room with no real witness, jury, or testimony. Yagami and Yamada departed perhaps ten to eleven days after the crash. Kitamura lived for close to a month after that. You have to have autopsies that show that he did not die in the timeframe where Yagami and Yamada were present. And if they WERE present, you know that Yagami and Yamada would have been humanly INCAPABLE of getting to where they were recovered by thousands of unbiased soldiers if they had killed Kitamura at the time his autopsy shows.”  
  
_ And boom. Sato was gritting his teeth while the mother broke down into sobs. This was fucking monstrous. Helpless, Shin looked to Teramoto who was stone-faced while he opened up a bag. No, stop, don’t make that woman suffer anymore.   
  
He took out a…rather sun bleached journal. Opening it, he slid it across the table and tapped his finger to show the Kitamura couple a specific entry. _“This is Kitamura’s handwriting, yes?”_ _  
  
_The mother had stared through bleary eyes but nodded. _“You see where he wrote…Day 10, dumbfuck Yagami and Yamada set out in the desert today. Two cases of water issued, four cases down. Thirty boxes of field rations issued, sixty boxes down. A dead man…would not have been able to write that.”  
  
_ Sato had blanched. Kitamura’s father looked lost for a moment before slowly shaking his head. Yea, there…there was no closure here at all. And Sato just wanted to dig the knife deeper.  
  
Shin closed his eyes, shaking his head. After the general found that it was ‘purely nonsense’ and dismissed them, Shin wanted to crawl into a hole and die. Instead, Komari urged him to come relax in a sauna with some sake.  
  
“I…I can’t imagine what they’re going through” Shin whispered, “I mean, to have your kid die like that in the first place but then to have some rat bastard tell you it was someone else’s fault?”  
  
Komari shook her head, staring into the steam, “…Imagine being that sick in the head, that hateful.”  
  
He just…really couldn’t. To hate him _that_ much? For something he didn’t even _do_? He did not _born himself_! Kasumi closed her eyes, shrugging, “…He will most likely be demoted and discharged. He was skating on thin ice and Kitamura’s father is higher in rank. I’m sure he was simply just wanting to hear the validity of the charges. To have them dismantled so neatly is not a becoming look for Sato.”  
  
Right… Komari scoffed, resting her ear on Kasumi’s thigh, “I can only hope…speaking of racist dictators, you said you hooked back up with your girl, Shin. What was the back story on all that nonsense with her dad?”  
  
“…Yea, she, uh…didn’t really tell me?”  
  
His other best friend stared at him quietly before she droned, “…She didn’t tell you?”  
  
“Nope. She…gave me a hint?”  
  
Sitting up, Komari leered, “…Here’s a riddle for why I didn’t speak up on my dad’s asshole remarks about how you’re not good enough? Shin.”  
  
“It was _a lot_ , Mari. And really, I’m so done, I could stand to be soaking in a bathtub with her right now regardless, I don’t even care” he droned, rubbing his face.  
  
“Oh, naturally, I’d rather be walking over hot coals right now versus that bullshit we just went through so _hell yea_ on that option. But still. What was the riddle?”  
  
Shin leaned back on his palms, closing his eyes, “…You’ve seen it in your family. Oh, outside of it. And you know something is off in mine. You probably just never thought to look past me meaning her.”  
  
Even Kasumi raised a brow as Komari gawked, “…She gave you an _actual_ riddle?”  
  
“Well, it’s…probably not so much a riddle?”  
  
“Kids, man” Komari sighed airily.  
  
Shin smirked, “Well, shed your wisdom, ‘nee-san’, because I’ve been stumped for weeks.”  
  
“Why?” scoffed Kasumi, standing, “It’s her mother.”  
  
…What? Kasumi leaned over and kissed Komari tenderly, rubbing her shoulder, “I’m going to get dried off. Don’t be long.”  
  
“Sure thing, baby” Komari nodded, squeezing her hand.  
  
…Wait though, her mother?? Shin stared, wide-eyed, after Kasumi who left without another word. Komari came and sat beside him, staring at the top of the structure. “…Yea, Sumi’s right. I don’t think I would have gotten that much on my own either though, don’t feel bad. It’s hard seeing things when you’re too close.”  
  
Shin swallowed. “I’ve seen it in my family yet outside my family…”  
  
“That sick ass bastard step-father of yours, you said he was beating your mom, right?”  
  
… _SHIT._ Shin almost choked. _“…Oh my God, Mari_.”  
  
Komari frowned as this giant Ferris wheel in this toiled amusement park of his and Lyla’s relationship started turning. Shit! Shin felt… _enlightenment_ and it felt bad! “Her mom…rarely if _ever_ leaves the house. Only when the dad isn’t there! Lyla stopped having us go to her house after a while when we were kids—Lyla never had a scratch on her but—but if that bastard is beating her mom in front of her to comply—oh my GOD, Komari!”  
  
Well…Lyla was right: he was ready to go throw her son of a bitch father into a river. Komari shook her head in disbelief. “…He’s probably holding the mom hostage and not letting Lyla make her own decisions else he’ll do something horrible to her mother. What a fucking terrible feeling that’d have to be, man.”  
  
“Oh, and I will end it” he hissed.  
  
“One mission after the other…” Komari murmured.  
  
Yes. But like this one, he was going to see it through, no matter what monster got in the way. Just…hold on, Lyla, Lillian. It sounded like a damsel in distress scenario, a cliché marred in sexism and tradition. But without Komari and Kasumi, he’d still be lost in the dark, blind. He’d…he’d been given new sight.  
  
Damsel in distress or not, Lyla had carried this burden on her own long enough. She…she had given him the breath of life when she came back into it.

He could at least be a new set of eyes for her too.  
  



	19. Alive

**Chapter 19:** Alive

 **End Note:** Final chapter!  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_December 21st, 2002. He’d just made it.  
  
He was actually pleased when he found no one was at home. He hadn’t announced he was coming back today so they didn’t know but they also weren’t cooped up in the house, worrying. Good. It…it gave him a chance to check on something else that had been at the forefront of his mind.  
  
The last time he came up these steps, he came back down them crushed and destroyed. He didn’t understand what had happened. Now? Lyla couldn’t say anything. Then. She said she hadn’t seen her father in some time because of him, because of his ‘death’. She had WANTED to lay him out but…well, Shin had to admit, he’d choose his mama every time too.  
  
He wanted that to end though.  
  
Shin managed to get to the last step when the door suddenly swung open. Oh crap. He always got ahead of himself, her dad probably would bludgeon him right here. No. Shin smiled when he found Lyla on the other side, her face trembling. He…felt so relieved. Holding his arms open, he murmured, “…Hey, baby.”  
  
She shook her head, rushing into his embrace. “B-Baka. Baka! K-Koji came and told me that you w-went BACK over there!! What would I-I have done if something happened THIS TIME? I didn’t get to say goodbye to you again!!”  
  
He sighed, resting his cheek against the crown of her head. “…Don’t worry about that. I’m coming back to you every time.”  
  
“You’re too confident!” she wept.  
  
“And you’re being pessimistic” he chided lightly, pulling away to wipe her eyes, “…Perhaps I am too confident. But I won’t claim things I don’t want and I’m not claiming a death wish. Just let me have that bit of…superstition.”  
  
Lyla scrunched the cloth of his coat, murmuring, “…Yes.”  
  
She felt so nice and warm and he was about to FREEZE TO DEATH. “Was…was it always this cold in December?”  
  
His spine…actually felt like it was rattling. His shivers were causing his entire backbone to quake. Lyla gasped, pulling away, “Oh no, you haven’t felt winter in forever!”  
  
Sure…hadn’t. Wasn’t sure which he preferred right now: hotter than Hell or Antarctica. He looked up when the door opened, still holding Lyla. No matter…who it was, he wasn’t letting go again.  
  
“Oh!”  
  
With a smile, Shin nodded at Okamoto Lillian, the woman wearing a blue shawl over a blue long sleeved dress, her hair up in an unbelievably strict bun. “Hello, ma’am.”  
  
Her purple eyes seemed delighted. It crossed his mind that maybe Lyla meant that her mom was against him TOO, that also occurred in his family. Unless she was acting, that didn’t seem to be the case. “It’s so good to see you, dear—Lyla, bring him inside, it’s freezing out here!”  
  
Lyla nodded, grasping his hand. Oh, Bajiru must not have been here then. Leaning over to untie his leather dress shoes, he took a deep breath as Lyla led him to sit in their living room. It looked about the same as when they were kids, just minor technical updates here and there in the television and phone.  
  
Sitting right beside him, Lyla squeezed his hand while he removed his hat, his ponytail falling with the action. “Did they say anything about your hair?”  
  
“Mm, wasn’t big on their things to berate me over, no” Shin smirked, “I’ll cut it eventually.”  
  
Lillian had walked into the kitchen before coming to sit on the recliner, crossing her hands. “I’m so glad you’re all right. Lyla was absolutely devastated when you were missing and prematurely labeled dead. I can’t imagine what your mother was going through.”  
  
“Ha, my mama was one of the only people that presumed I was still alive” his brows quirked, “She stayed at home, waiting for me. She…she was the first family member I saw.”  
  
Sighing, Lillian nodded, looking down vaguely, “Well…your mother does seem to be made of a different material versus most daughters of the area. We weren’t taught to be so…optimistic.”  
  
Wow. “I don’t think she was either. I’m not sure where that faith comes from, really. I told her it was kind of crazy she was waiting for me for that long.”  
  
“Well, maybe that was her mama instinct” Lillian smiled, tilting her head, “…Like mine says you’re being a bit clingy, Lyla dear.”  
  
Lyla pouted, indeed not having let go of his hand since he sat down. With a chuckle, he held her fingers a bit tighter, “I’ve been trying to convince your daughter for a while now you might accept me as a son-in-law, Okamoto-san.”  
  
“E-Eh?” squeaked Lyla, her green eyes widening.  
  
“Well, maybe not in those EXACT words…” he blinked at her knowingly.  
  
Flustering, Lyla sulked at him, “And definitely not in FRONT of either of our parents, mister.”  
  
Well… Lillian laughed, chiding lightly, “Perhaps it’s a serious request then, no?”  
  
Lyla fell quiet and he guessed he’d…ease into this. “…It’s not the first time we’ve discussed it, Okamoto-san. I’d say…one reason we stopped speaking for a time was that I was upset with Lyla over an interaction I had with your husband. I…was told to stop seeing her in any way.”  
  
Lillian looked surprised. Why? Did he discuss banning his presence or…was he just making that decision on his own, just like everything else, it seemed? “…Bajiru said that?”  
  
“And then some.”  
  
“Well, Lyla…your father has a lot of control when it comes to me mostly but you know well that I don’t want him doing the same thing to you. If you want to be with Shin, that’s what I want you to do” Lillian insisted.  
  
“…You know it’s not that simple” Lyla said, barely audible.  
  
Leaning back into the light blue velvet chair where she sat, Lillian gazed toward the overcast sky beyond the window in the room. Shin took a small opportunity to look her over. Some abrasions on her knuckles but very light, could be passed off as something else. A man like Bajiru would make sure any markings weren’t seen and the woman always wore a lot of clothes.   
  
“I’ll be all right, Lyla. I don’t want this burden to go on generationally any longer. I want it to end with you” Lillian remarked after a few minutes of silence.  
  
Lyla scoffed. Yea, he didn’t blame her. “…I’m not a hundred percent sure of what’s occurring, Okamoto-san, but I…I think I have an idea. And, were my mother in the same situation, there’s no way I’d leave her either.”  
  
“…As a parent, I want to assure you both that we would never want you to hold yourselves responsible for our suffering and suffer along with us. Especially not when happiness is on the table somewhere.”  
  
“Oh, mama…” Lyla rasped.  
  
“Okamoto-san, just…just come with us. I won’t…be able to give anything as big as THIS but I’ll take care of you until both Lyla and I can get on our feet. We’re…we’re pretty clever people so I know we can” Shin offered.  
  
The woman smiled as Marianne came in, carrying a tray of tea, “Thank you, Marianne…I believe it actually was occurring in your mother’s bloodline too, Shin. The Kobayashi is a matriarchal family, correct?”  
  
“Y…Yes.”  
  
“The sect of the Fujiwara family I belonged to was also a matriarchal family” Lillian explained, picking up her porcelain cup of tea, “My father, he was an Maekawa. I never got to meet him, he died when I was a baby. My mother remarried an Usui and had another daughter. That man was the one that raised me mostly, he was very caring and sweet. My poor mother didn’t have good luck though, he died from pneumonia when my sister and I were in our late teens—respiratory illnesses ran in their family, she also has weak lungs.”  
  
Huh…Koji had mentioned something like that back when he talked about his childhood ‘fiancee’. “My mother remarried for the third and last time because, unfortunately, my grandfather willed it. That was the ridiculous part: it’s a supposed matriarchal family but we place the final stake in whether we have a husband or not and then he is “allowed” to run things. As such, my grandfather had it written that those who controlled the name had to marry. Since I’m the oldest, I held the stake in having to marry to maintain our family name and legacy.”  
  
Shin nodded slowly. Okay… “To be honest, I…wouldn’t fret leaving Bajiru. We’ve never cared very much for one another. I know he doesn’t like me and I…can’t say I’m very fond of him either. Just--…to give up my family’s legacy is what he wants. He owns it no matter what I do. I…I struggle with that.”  
  
“Understandable” Shin murmured. This wasn’t Bajiru’s inheritance at all, just foolishness willed in the name of ‘matriarchal’ or ‘patriarchal’ families. Didn’t seem like either were balanced or knew how to be. _

_Still though… “…Do you have the paperwork? I mean, the…wills and whatnot? Maybe we can find a loophole.”  
  
“Loophole?” frowned Lillian.  
  
Smiling softly, Shin kissed Lyla’s hand, “…I’ve been getting lucky lately getting the upper hand without…having to bend too many rules. Your husband wants to keep you under his thumb with threats and tyranny, let’s…see if we can figure out the right way.”  
  
_“…Wow.”  
  
Lillian had been reluctant. Lyla too. Again, this was playing out as an all-mighty man coming to rectify their woes. No, again, he needed someone to have his back this entire time. He needed two sets of eyes. Plus, if…he could be a bit selfish, he wanted Lyla to be in his life and to be comfortable there. If it were him, he’d never be able to do that worrying about his mama’s safety. No, this…this needed to be fixed.  
  
Shin read about…three pages of the will once Lillian conceded, going to Bajiru’s office. With those three pages, he felt like an absolute dummy reading a forgotten language. Thus, he called over Yagami Koji and Nerimaru. Maybe their ‘college smarts’ would help him here.  
  
The twins came over, giving him a look. _“Well, well, look who’s just HOME mysteriously and came over here first.”  
  
_ Shin has snorted, saying they were acting like they were home twenty minutes ago. Koji snickered, _“Remember Christmas? We had some last minute presents to get.”  
  
_ Oh, hell, he had to do that too. Well, one task at a time. Advising them of what needed to be done without getting into too many sordid details, he gave them some of the copies he made. Koji had stared at the first page before looking to Lyla who was also reading over it, seeming annoyed. “ _…We do have the original copy, right?”  
  
“Yea?”  
  
“…Give it to me.”  
  
_Not asking his brother any questions, Koji…left with it. Um? Lyla looked up absently before shaking her head. “… _Father comes and catches on to us, he might seek to amend any possible loopholes. That’s the original copy. While the courts also have a notarized version, it wouldn’t hurt to be cautious.”  
  
_ Wow. He was just doing espionage and now it felt like he was a rookie. Well, he was glad for their insight then. With the five of them, they could find something to shut this ‘patriarchal’ nonsense down.  
  
Or so he thought.  
  
Koji was sitting in Bajiru’s chair, his feet up on the desk, rubbing his chin between flipping pages. Nelly was sitting in one of the chairs on the other side of the desk, holding his head as he read as well. Shin was reading but having to stop to check a dictionary to make sure he got the actual implementation of these words. If…it was making sense…  
  
“Um…no offense” Koji drawled, flipping the large document back to the front for the third time, “…But your grandfather was…kind of an absolute jerk for this, wow.”  
  
Nelly shook his head, his dark eyes wide, “If I am a hundred percent understanding this lingo…? If Bajiru and you die, Lillian-san, and Lyla remained unmarried, she legally is not able to own this house in any regard and it goes back to the next male in the original bloodline. And the sky’s the limit on that, it can be a fifth cousin.”  
  
Lillian nodded grimly, “That’s what I figured…it’s no use.”  
  
No! Lyla looked to him miserably as he gritted his teeth, “…What if we dangle Bajiru out of a window?”  
  
“Might make us feel better but that fifth cousin still gets the house” Koji droned.  
  
What the hell. A rapid knock came at the door, startling everyone. Lillian sat up straighter, frowning, “…Yes?”  
  
“Ma’am, Okamoto-san has returned.”  
  
The color left Lillian’s skin as Lyla stood, shaking her head. “You should go, Shin, Koji, Nelly…”  
  
“No” Shin grunted, “…He’s not going to make me run again after all this.”  
  
“But _Shin--”_

Right…right, Lillian. Koji sat up straight, looking to Lyla’s mother for a moment before shaking his head. “Either way, we’re getting you out of this, Lillian-san, so there’s no reason to be concerned. Can you have a bag with your things packed?”  
  
“E-Eh?”   
  
“Just an overnight bag—or at least a change of clothes for a couple of days. We’ll figure something out in no time but we don’t want to play our hand too soon.”  
  
Lillian looked alarmed. Shin couldn’t blame her, this could end very badly. However, he and Koji were on the same wavelength: leaving her here right now was not an option. Lyla bit her lip but nodded at Marianne, “Please, pack mama a quick bag and you can bring the one I left by the door.”  
  
“Y-Yes, ma’am.”  
  
Koji stuffed the will back into an envelope and replaced it in Bajiru’s drawer, standing when the door was flung open. Shin stared absently as Bajiru looked at them hotly. “What the hell is the meaning of this?”  
  
“Oh, just reviewing some legalities” Koji answered casually.  
  
“You have _no business_ here” he snarled, pushing past them to go to his desk, “Clark! Call the police!”  
  
Shin rolled his eyes as Lillian stared at Bajiru, trembling. Oh, Shin could make him shake in fear too…after surveying the situation, the man must’ve been…satisfied to still see the will was in place. Koji had taken a bit of time to forge a pretty convincing few cover pages that matched the original.  
  
“I thought I told you that no one in this house will have any further business with you” Bajiru said lowly, looking up at Shin.  
  
Huh. Shin might actually understand Teramoto’s lackadaisical shrug now, what the hell was he supposed to say that wouldn’t fan the flames? So, he shrugged, and Bajiru glared. “…You were better off dead.”  
  
Probably. Lyla balled her fists, her green eyes narrowing, “You…you have no right to say anything like that to him. Shin has done wonderful things and you-you have no right.”  
  
Lyla… Bajiru gazed at her emptily before he scoffed, leaning back in his chair, “Oh, so you had run off to _him_. Foolish. I knew early you didn’t have good sense.”  
  
“I have enough” Lyla muttered.  
  
Lillian folded her hands before her, staring at him. Shin couldn’t…even imagine being forced to be with someone you never once loved for this long. More than twenty years, she was made to put up with an abusive stranger. That they even had Lyla, the…mere act of it may have been of some atrocity or at least awkwardness. There was a lot…that he was still learning to cope with. He was fully realizing he might not even be able to. But…that? That was no way to live at all.  
  
“…I’m leaving, Bajiru, for the holidays” Lillian said faintly, “Lyla and I. We haven’t gotten to take a holiday in quite some time.”  
  
“I don’t recall agreeing to such” Bajiru replied.  
  
Visibly swallowing, Lillian pursed her lips. Well…between him, Koji, and Nelly, they could definitely outnumber him if they had to. Prepared to suggest that Bajiru was a little too high on his horse for this situation, Lillian said firmly, “…I don’t have to discuss it. It’s simply going to be done.”  
  
“You have a lot of bravado with your little calvary here, I take it.”  
  
“Perhaps. But it’s needed to be done for a long time now.”  
  
Bajiru snorted, giving off a caustic laugh, “Woman. You’ve seen that will, you know your grandfather—you’d lose all this for _what_? Living impoverished, something your spoiled ass has never done? Working with not one skill in your name? All for the sake of making a point? That’s your business. This is mine.”  
  
“You divorce me, the will is moot” Lillian muttered.  
  
“I won’t divorce you” Bajiru sighed, kicking back a bit, “You can leave if it suits you. Find out how the other side lives for a time, see the struggle. But just like I won’t divorce you, you know divorcing _me_ means I get this house and all of the trust fund. Meanwhile, you leaving or separating, I still get this house and the trust fund. I can’t get rid of you but for you to leave? It works out for me regardless.”  
  
Shin gritted his teeth, just…appalled. Koji smiled. “…Can I go help Marianne pack? I don’t know if I want to catch an assault charge this close to Christmas.”  
  
Nelly mused, “I mean, we could probably get out in two days, right…?”  
  
Bajiru glowered, his green eyes narrowed, “To threaten me on my own land, _whenever_ those cops arrive, just gives me more grounds for this home invasion.”  
  
Cracking his knuckles, Koji looked enlightened, saying with a surprisingly delighted tone: “So we’re going to prison _regardless_?”  
  
“Stop it” Shin leered, holding up his hand, “No one’s going to prison. We’re leaving if Marianne isn’t back in the next minute or two, we have plenty of clothes both of you can use.”  
  
Like something was answering this terse situation, Marianne rushed back with two printed bags. Shin grabbed both of them, tipping his head. “Thank you, Marianne. You ladies ready?”  
  
Lyla nodded, following them without a hint of hesitancy. Lillian on the other hand, seemed to be…faltering. Oh jeez. Bajiru gazed at her hard, his fingers crossed, “…Don’t be an idiot, Lillian, if you can possibly figure out how to.”  
  
Damn, he wanted to punch that bastard’s face in. Lillian took a deep breath…and walked toward them at last. “Sleep well, Bajiru.”  
  
“Oh, I will. You try to get comfortable on someone else’s pity.”  
  
When they walked out the door, Koji whistled highly, “Buddy-y-y-y, next time you call _me_ into a situation like that, it better be to punch somebody’s _face in_.”  
  
“Hopefully we don’t end up in too many of these types of situation, Koji” Shin retorted dryly, “I need us to figure out how we get this house back.”  
  
Nelly stretched, yawning, “Mm, I think we have some big guns we can call in. There’s always a way.”  
  
Lyla quietly held his hand, looking to him. Her eyes seemed…forlorn. “…If I were a son, it’d be okay. I…would have this house for mama.”  
  
“No offense, baby, but I kind of prefer you as a daughter” Shin drawled.  
  
She smirked, pinching him, before pulling him to kiss his cheek. “…Thank you for…for coming to find me like you always do.”  
  
“Of course.”  
  
…Now just to find a way for her to stay.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
“Wow, if this is not a product of our time.”  
  
Their parents never particularly needed an office but the family computer, sort of like the ‘easy access for information computer’, was in an enclosed area enough for them to work. When Shin got home, his parents seemed irritated with him but were immediately surprised to see Lillian. His dad looked shocked. “…Oh no, what have they done?”  
  
“Hey, hey, we haven’t kidnapped or nothin’” Nelly had groused.

Lillian smiled…sadly. “…They want to possibly help me get out of a bad situation. If…nothing else, I want to spend this time with my daughter.”  
  
Lyla was dismayed because it sounded like the woman was having her last holiday or something. Not if they could help it. Explaining the situation, Yamada nodded. “I have just the man for the job.”  
  
After about two hours, Izumi Craig, his father’s longtime friend and a local politician, showed up. Oh yea, big guns.  
  
The others had departed, just leaving Shin, Craig, and Yamada in the room. Koji and Nelly were going to do the holiday dinner shopping, Lyla offered to make dinner for tonight, and Dana advised she was going to sit Lillian down and have a chat. The kids weren’t home yet, still out living life, he supposed. Shin…guessed he could be living life soon. After this.  
  
Craig was looking at the document, his sandy eyebrows raised. He was like a dirty blond version of Yamada, his eyes just a bit darker blue and about three centimeters shorter. Dad often looked to him for these matters and Craig always seemed quick to help. However, for him to say this was a product of their time? Mm, not promising.  
  
His dad scoffed, looking at one of the copies they brought, “Maybe a product of _your_ time. We didn’t have anything this insane in Wasaba because we didn’t have anything.”  
  
“If you did, I promise a man could legally bind anyone to take everything your mom had” Craig smirked, rubbing his face.  
  
Yamada’s brows quirked at that, shaking his head, “Well, you got me there.”  
  
“There’s nothing…?” Shin asked softly.  
  
Craig waved a hand, “No, no, there is always a stipulation in something this backwards that can be used to undermine it. Nothing this ridiculous can be rock solid.”  
  
“Ah…thank you, Craig-san. I hope this isn’t taking you away from anything, I know it’s close to the holidays.”  
  
“Nah…the wife and I divorced last year and she took the kids from me” he mumbled, “I need the distraction.”  
  
Shin’s eyes widened, shocked. He didn’t know a whole lot about Craig’s family situation. He knew the man _just_ had a baby, what made the wife leave him or vice versa? His dad shook his head, “…I know it sounds crazy coming from me, Craig, but Kira wouldn’t have taken full custody of my kids.”  
  
“I didn’t have a leg to stand on, Yamada, unless I bought the judge and I _try_ to avoid that” Craig sulked, taking a drink of wine Yamada offered earlier.  
  
Cutting his eyes, Yamada replied, “…I don’t like playing the system at all, Craig, but I’d make some considerations before my wife took my kids _back_ to Wasaba and then wouldn’t allow me to pay child support.”  
  
Like… _what_? Craig squeezed the bridge of his nose, groaning, “…Yea, my son is not going to be balanced given he’s working a full time job and in high school. I’m going to end up answering for this.”  
  
“Mm.”  
  
“I’m telling you though, he’s a good kid! And just a year older than a certain daughter…”  
  
What now? Shin’s eyes shot up quickly, uncertain what the hell Craig was implying. Whose daughter?? Yamada blinked languidly, not looking up but flipping over another page, “Absolutely not.”  
  
“What’s wrong with my kid?!”  
  
“Dunno yet, give it time.”  
  
“You know, Yamada--”  
  
His dad smirked widely, his eyes half-closed, “First, I would _never_ match anyone with my _only_ daughter, I’d rather _die_ first. What if I suggested Shaun for Nyoko?”  
  
“I mean, I’d…entertain the idea” Craig droned.  
  
“Second, I would think you’d know why I’m against matchmaking in general.”  
  
Craig made a face, “I’m not saying she has to _marry him_ , man, I just think he could stand to see a Subamite young woman with drive and discipline!”  
  
“Are we addressing _our_ Jill?” Shin demanded.  
  
“And there goes three” Yamada said dryly.  
  
With a snicker, Craig sighed, “Fine, fine. I’ll let the cards fall where they may and stay out of it. He is a beatnik. But I know your daughter isn’t going to end up a nun like you hope, friend.”  
  
The hell not?! Yamada chuckled, “Yea, given our lean to not be Catholic, that would be a stretch.”  
  
Grr. Craig drank the last of his wine as Yamada poured himself another glass, stroking his chin, “…I’ll have my lawyer look at this, guys. He can get me an answer back by tomorrow.”  
  
“That’d be great…” Shin whispered.  
  
Taking a copy, Craig tipped his head, “I’m going to head out, Yamada. I’ll be by tomorrow.”  
  
“Ah, you sure you don’t want to stay for dinner?” Yamada frowned, standing.  
  
“Oh no, I had an early dinner with some constituents. Might drop by for whatever Christmas feast you have, if I’m welcome.”  
  
Shaking the man’s hand, Yamada nodded, “Of course you are. If you _do_ have the kids, they’re welcome as well.”  
  
Craig scoffed, “Kira _hated_ Christmas the most so I can’t see that occurring. But we’ll see.”  
  
Suddenly, Yamada’s beeper went off and he groaned, rubbing his face. “…My holiday doesn’t start until tomorrow so Matsushima is probably going to run me into the ground for the next few hours. Let me call to try to coax him otherwise…”  
  
“Good luck, man” Craig laughed.  
  
Shin walked with Craig to the door, mostly out of manners, but surprisingly the man tilted his head. “Don’t ask any questions. Just come along.”  
  
…Uh, what? Was he being kidnapped? Shin made a face, stuffing his hands into his pockets and glancing back. Well, he could take Craig if that were the case. “…Okay.”  
  
Getting into the man’s Mercedes without another word, Shin frowned as they turned in the circle and rolled up the long driveway, turning to go deeper into Subami. Subami was the ‘new money’ territory, typically. It was sprinkled with old money families like Lyla’s but of course newcomers purchased up the land within the less populated areas. Craig lived in the almost completely old money area, called Wensington. Why were they going to his house?  
  
Apparently getting to Craig’s gigantic mansion, probably at least a half a house bigger than his childhood home, Craig stopped in the gigantic white stoned entry. He cleared his throat and reached into the back, pulling the Okamoto will into the front seat. “…I’m still going to have my lawyer look at it.”  
  
Oh no. “…Okay.”  
  
“But I _did_ locate a loophole.”  
  
Eh?? “Y-You did? Why didn’t you say anything?”   
  
“Because your parents would kill me.”  
  
…What? Clearing his throat, Craig turned to about the thirtieth page. “In layman’s terms, this sequence indicates that a male heir needs to be produced. Should a male heir not be produced within twenty years of the marriage, the position of ownership can be challenged.”  
  
Yes! “That-that’s fantastic!”  
  
“—By another man.”  
  
Damn it! Shin felt his delight crash down, gritting his teeth. “…And how is that a loophole?”  
  
“That’s the part where I didn’t want to have this conversation anywhere near your home, son.”  
  
Huh? Confused, Shin looked to Craig who raised his brows, “…Up until recently, Bajiru had enough time because the deadline hadn’t come. Alas, given that Lyla is now 21, he is a year overdue. He was probably comfortable because, well, you were ‘dead’.”  
  
…What? “I’m more than a hundred percent certain he is out there trying to get Lyla engaged to whoever will keep him in place right now. _However_ , should _another_ man of the house take his place before he can settle that…”  
  
Wait a minute. Shin gaped, the…light leading somewhere different this time in his head. “…Are…are you recommending I marry Lyla so _I_ own the house?”  
  
Craig shrugged, “Lyla can’t take ownership and neither can Lillian. However, Bajiru did not meet the agreement to have a male heir within the twenty years and now Lyla can marry and have her husband become owner of the property legally.”  
  
…Oh. Shin was…shocked, to say the least. His heart racing, he kneaded his hands. Oh. Oh man. “B-But there has to be a loophole to that loophole, Craig-san. Why…why wouldn’t he have tried to have a son?”  
  
“Because he assumed he had a daughter he could manipulate and control into marrying a scapegoat. Look at Lyla’s previous suitors. They were all rich so they’d not even require the mansion and he could stay on it. They probably wouldn’t have bothered to try to remove him so he retains ownership.”  
  
…Right. Parsley would have probably wanted to return to Greece and, from what he knew about Louis, he had a pretty large family estate anyway. “Oh my God…”  
  
“Like I said, if this is too scary for you, I’m having my guy look at it tonight. He’ll probably have something else in the works that he sees but…I would move fast. Bajiru has been a master manipulator for some time and he’s probably working to get Lyla entrapped right now.”  
  
Over his dead body. “…Thank you, Craig. And I…definitely appreciate you not having this conversation in front of my parents. They _will_ have a fit.”  
  
“Eh, probably not as bad as you think. They know sometimes things have to be done.”  
  
Yea, but him marrying at 21 fresh out of being labeled dead by the military probably wasn’t one of them. But…if she…said yes…  
  
“Anyway, there was one other reason I brought you here.”  
  
Huh? There was _more_? The blond man stepped out of the car, waving him toward the side of the house. Shin followed, wondering what business he’d have over here. “So, I was a little worried about your old man’s mental state after you were labeled dead. You know, he’s…been through a whole hell of a lot, Shin.”  
  
…Yes. Nodding glumly, a gnawing feeling in his heart that he briefly made the man suffer more, Shin looked up as Craig stopped by a covered car. “I had him followed by some of my men to make sure he didn’t do anything…reckless. One weird day, I got the call that he had…decided to sell your car in a panic, a…car that was about to become all kinds of rare.”  
  
…What? Shin stared as Craig shook his head, “…Not to get into any old details but your dad and I do not have a good track record when it comes to rare cars. Long story short, son, please don’t get lost in the desert anymore and leave your things with your dad.”  
  
If disbelief was a person, they just walked up to Shin and tried to say his car was not lost to the annals of time. Instead, they yanked the cover off and there sat his beloved Toyota Supra in immaculate condition, his Honda motorcycle cradled nearby.   
  
Shin covered his mouth, staring, before walking over slowly. There were nicks he accidentally put on the driver’s mirror. A light scratch from someone skidding by him on a bike. He saw a Pearl Jam CD cover in the floor. Holy _shit_. “C-Craig-san, oh my God, I—I don’t even know what to _say_. T-Thank you so much. M-My God, how much do I owe you?”  
  
“Oh no, son, your dad will be making this payment” Craig smiled, patting his back, “He will owe me for the rest of his natural life for previous and similar transactions.”  
  
What…? Giving him the keys, Craig waved him off. “Go think about what I said while I get my lawyer over here to look at this. If he finds something else, you can annul it or you can just wait but…just putting it on the table.”  
  
And it was some spread. Smiling, bowing lowly in absolute gratitude, Shin jumped into his car after managing to tie his bike into the trunk and started it up. He laughed when, _of all things_ , Pearl Jam’s ‘Alive’ immediately came on where he must’ve left it last time he drove before this entire nightmare began. _Is something wrong? She said, ‘of course there is; you’re still alive’, she said. Oh, do I deserve to be? Is that the question? And if so, if so, who answers? Who answers? I, oh, I’m still alive. Yea, I, oh, I’m still alive_.  
  
All grins, he gunned it up the road to head back home. He’d probably be full of nightmares tonight. Anguish, turmoil, guilt, suffering. No matter how many good things he was handed back from his previous life, where he was in that desert, murdering to survive, losing his mind, it sat there like a shadow that couldn’t go away.

But the life he was getting ready to live that was just ahead of him? It…it looked amazing. He…he was alive.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _“DUDE!”  
  
Shin laughed as Koji and Nelly had pulled in behind him, the twins looking flabbergasted and rushing over to view this miracle. Koji gawked, “BRO. We KNEW this was GONE, what the fuck?!”  
  
Yagami Yamada came to the door before he responded. His blue eyes widened and he…very slowly walked out. “…Did that wine really get to me or is this your car?”  
  
Snickering, Shin patted his back, “Apparently Craig was having you followed when I was ‘dead’ and saw you selling my car. He bought it and advised that you owe him for this and a ‘previous’ transaction for the ‘rest of your natural life’.”  
  
Yamada smiled, his hands in his pockets, “…I definitely do.”  
  
“Man, if this is not a Christmas miracle, I don’t know what is” Nelly whistled.  
  
“Hey, what’s—eh?”  
  
He glanced back as Lyla peeked out. Her green eyes were wide as she rushed over, “Oh my goodness, Shin, is that your car?”  
  
“It sure is” he nodded, hugging her shoulders, “Let’s go for a ride after dinner. I’m starving.”  
  
Just…play it cool. The…last time they had this conversation, it set them on a two year schism that was only really rectified by him supposedly dying. It…really may have just been a convenient excuse, this whole deal with her parents, though a very valid one. But, well…with or without Craig’s loophole, he…he knew. Deep down, even when he was denying the possibility to the infinitely more romantic Koji, he knew.   
  
He wanted her by his side.  
  
_“You know, I didn’t expect you to take me to a make-out hill.”  
  
Shin laughed, putting his old car into park when they came to his desired location. It was a bit of a hill, overlooking the starry sky. He hadn’t brought her here before but he always thought it was a beautiful point. And she was calling it a make-out hill. “Ma’am, get your mind out of the gutter.”  
  
“I didn’t bring us here” she stuck out her tongue.  
  
“I can make out with you anywhere, why would I bring you here to do so?” he teased.  
  
She pouted, leaning over to kiss him. “…I’m so happy you’re home. And…and I don’t think I figured you’d realize what I meant but I’m…I’m glad you did.”  
  
Shin stroked her hair, murmuring, “…Your mama didn’t deserve this, Lai. She should have been able to find the husband she loved if she so wanted to even marry. She should have been able to have happy days without belittling or harm. She has some…man that is using her merely for fortune and property. He doesn’t love her and he seems to even dislike you both. I know…that I want better for you but I want it for your mom too. I want her to find happiness.”  
  
“Me too” she whispered. “…I hope something can be found. It just…looks so hopeless.”  
  
“Well, that’s…kind of why I brought you here.”  
  
Looking to him questioningly, she shook her head, “What?”  
  
He cleared his throat, stepping out of the car. Lyla followed, frowning, “…What’s going on, Shin?”  
  
“I want to make it perfectly and abundantly clear, Lyla, that…when we parted ways those two years ago, I meant what I said. I want to be with you. I still want to be by your side. I clammed up but I…I meant it when I said my wife would never be expected to have to submit to me. I meant that…I wanted that person to be you.”  
  
Lyla stared at him, wide-eyed, as he flustered. This was still nerve-wracking. “…Craig mentioned a loophole he found. You parents have to had a male heir within twenty years of marriage or else the terms of agreement weren’t met. A…new heir can challenge that. That heir would have to be…your husband.”  
  
“… _Oh_.”  
  
“But Lai, seriously, I…I’m not saying we put on a sham or whatever just to get your dad out of there. If you tell me ‘no’, I understand, but I mean it with or without this add-on: I want to marry you. I…I wish I…still had the ring. I told Marianne to get rid of it…”  
  
He could get her another though. Lyla, trembling, slowly held up her right hand. Sitting on her finger was the ring she had left behind, maybe because she hadn’t wanted to but thought it was all she could do. “A-After you—after they said you were _dead_ , Mar-Marianne gave it to me, s-said you had asked her to throw it away but sh-she thought it was just too important.”  
  
Good ol’ Marianne. Taking her hand, Shin pressed her palm to his lips. Moving it to his cheek, looking at her, he murmured, “So, how about it, Lai? Will…will you marry me tonight?”  
  
“ _Tonight_?”  
  
“I promise, we can have a great wedding down the line and everything but Craig was of the thought your dad would get you hung up into something by tomorrow. I…I will fight for you every step of the way if it comes to something insane like that but…if possible, I want us to be ahead. That, and…an awesome Christmas gift would be you being my wife this time around.”  
  
She was dead silent and he…felt woe. She didn’t mean it. She didn’t want him. Maybe…maybe Yaya was right.   
  
“…Are you sure?”  
  
“What?”  
  
“I-I’m not pretty--”  
  
“The hell are you talking about?” he snarled, “You are absolutely _beautiful_ and I’ve thought that since I first saw your face. Don’t say such silly things.”  
  
“B-But Shin, I-I don’t have any _skills_. My dad made sure I was absolutely _useless_. I went to a useless school that taught me nothing that can help me support us—I’ll be a deadweight to you!” she cried.  
  
“You are not useless…you have so many skills, so many talents, you’ve just never been allowed to look at them as such. Even if you didn’t work, you’d never be _useless_ to me, stop that…”  
  
For a moment he thought she was making or finding excuses. He’d never told her anything like this. Her eyes were full of tears. No…these were things her father had said to not only her but her mother, the example of marriage that she’d seen. She saw Shin’s family as…special because they didn’t have these sorts of conversations.   
  
Smiling grimly, he kissed her tenderly. They both needed trauma healing. “…Lai, this is your life and your choice. If you don’t want to marry me, that is perfectly okay.”  
  
“ _Baka_ ” she choked, “Of course I want to _marry you_. What I don’t want is you to come to _resent me_. It’s easy to say all these things but when it comes down to it, I’m not bringing a full plate to this relationship and you’d set it upon yourself to make sure I’m filled. That’s not-that’s not how it’s supposed to _be_ , you shouldn’t have to work harder to fix me!”  
  
“Lyla…you told me when I said that to you that you weren’t out to fix me or hold me together. I’m not here for that either. But I want to be there while you do and…if I can help, I’m going to do that. We’ve…always made a pretty good team, I thought.”  
  
While she kneaded her hands, she whimpered, “…Me too.”  
  
Hm? She rushed into his chest, nodding, “Yes. Yes, I’ll marry you.”  
  
Oh. Shin wrapped her in his arms and kissed her temple, smiling broadly. “Wow. I got my car _and_ my girl tonight. This is awesome.”  
  
“Silly…”  
  
“C’mon, I think we have time before the courthouse closes” he replied, opening the door for her before rushing to his side.   
  
“Shin…you haven’t discussed this with your parents, I know you haven’t. What will they say?”  
  
“…Um, let’s worry about that in the morning.”  
  
Lyla’s brow rose as he pulled back onto the main road. “…The morning?”  
  
“Well, tonight’s our wedding night, right? I don’t think I want to make it back before morning unless you do…”  
  
“Nope, especially not with my mother there too.”  
  
He laughed, grasping her hand, “My girl.”  
  
Man…talk about setting up house fast. This…this was going to be some adventure.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _“I always forget about your weird extra name.”  
  
Shin wandered out of the bath adjoined to the nice hotel suite he was able to secure with money he had prior to his ‘death’. Wearing the complimentary robe, towel drying his long hair, he raised a brow at Lyla who was sitting on the bed in the same robe. Extra name? Oh. “Oh yea, the middle name thing. An Americanism, I suppose…”  
  
“David…” she patted her cheek, “Unusual.”  
  
“I think it’s actually super common in America” he yawned, stretching out on his side beside her, “My mom always tells me it means ‘beloved’.”  
  
“That’s so sweet!” she gasped, delighted. “Your parents took a lot of time to decide what to call you.”  
  
“Mm, maybe. I told you why I’m named ‘Shin’, right?”  
  
Lyla shook her head, curling up into his chest, “Yes, but you can tell me again.”  
  
“It’s my dad’s late best friend’s name. Except the guy was total garbage if you ask me. He…he caused a lot of suffering in our family. Looks like they might have been on point with that.”  
  
Pouting, she shook her head, “Hardly! I think it’s still sweet though, Shin. They named you after things they loved and cared about and indicated they love and care about you. I get so jealous you have such awesome parents.”  
  
“They’re yours now too, silly” he purred, kissing her forehead.  
  
They managed to speed race through the paperwork and get in the very last minute to be married at the courthouse right at nine. Apparently they only extended the hours because of the holiday and the popularity of getting married right now. The guy had seemed a little droll, probably thinking this was some spontaneous thought. A little bit but this wasn’t a flash in the pan marriage, as far as Shin was concerned.  
  
Lyla smiled, stroking his hair, “Yagami Lyla. I like it.”  
  
“Oh, I definitely do…” he murmured, leaning in to press his lips to hers.  
  
Caressing his lips tenderly, Lyla pulled away softly, pouting, “…NOW can we stop wearing protection?”  
  
“No!” he leered, “We JUST got married and have to tell our parents that which is going to already be off the chain. We can’t show up with their grandchild in September!”  
  
Lyla laughed, tapping him chidingly, “I’ll try to be a good mama.”  
  
“I know you will. It’s just not going to be proven in September 2003” he smirked.  
  
“Killjoy” she joked, softly pushing him on his back, “I got some sponges from the store anyway. I want to feel every bit of you tonight.”  
  
This girl. Blushing as she untied his robe, he closed his eyes as she stroked his cock with the lubricant provided by the hotel. It smelled like vanilla, actually. She continued to pump as she ran her tongue around the head, retracting his flesh for better access. Mm…  
  
“You know, today’s supposed to be for the bride…”  
  
“The bride’s doing what the bride wants” she teased, nibbling playfully.  
  
He smiled, groaning softly as her mouth sank down, drawing him in. Fuck. They…they really only got that one crazy night before he left…  
  
Lyla yelped as he gently pulled her head away and pulled her into his lap, wrapping his mouth around her nipple and gently kneading the other. Fuck, he wanted her. She rasped as his hand slipped up her robe, thumbing across her clit. TYPICALLY she didn’t need it but he grabbed the bottle of oil, putting a bit on his fingers, before returning to his previous administration.  
  
She shut her eyes, her lips parting as he made strong, slow strokes around her sex. It was funny, this was…pretty much the anniversary of their first time too. He was terrified then how…easily he succumbed, now he was very much in the game and where he wanted to be.  
  
With his wife._

Oh shit, with his wife.  
  
Lyla looked at him as they sat outside of the hotel they had stayed in all night in his car. He’d turned it on, excited to go home and share their good work with his parents. _He_ was ecstatic.  
  
Then the screeching of brakes entered his mind and his wheels started spinning.  
  
…He was the _first born_. Now, he was the _first one_ to get married. The first of his parent’s children to get married…and he didn’t invite them to come watch him get married.  
  
Yes, they’d have had their hang ups. It was rushed, he literally just got back from another stint in Iraq and got married in the same day after being cooped up in their home pretending to be dead. But he _could_ have told his parents. He was pretty sure they’d choose him telling them to see his less than romantic nuptials than come after the fact with he had eloped and not told them at all!  
  
God, his parents?! His siblings too! _He’d_ be pissed if they just meandered off and got married without mention too! Sobbing, he buried his face into his hands. He had messed up _hard_.

Lyla rubbed his hand, staring at him softly, “…We can go and annul the other one and come back?”  
  
“We’d have to wait like a week and they’d tell us we’re crazy” he groaned into his palm.  
  
“Do you regret it?”  
  
“Not a bit” he assured, pulling back to look at her, “…I just regret not telling my parents that bore my sorry ass so they could at least witness!”  
  
Biting her lip, Lyla nodded slowly. “…You’re right. I guess we…just got so excited.”  
  
Scratching his head, Shin took a deep breath before putting the car into drive. “…I am going to be…bludgeoned and disowned from my family but what’s done is done. I don’t regret it and I…I hope they will forgive me some time in the next two decades.”  
  
Lyla sighed and he started that…sickening journey home. Well…now he didn’t want to go home for other reasons, fantastic.  
  
His phone suddenly rang and he shivered. God, if it was his dad, he might cry on the spot. He did _not_ miss that constant connection to communication all of a sudden. Taking it out of his pocket, he lent it a quick glance before relaxing. Okay, he could take this. Pressing send, he looked around, “Hey, Mari.”  
  
“Hey, Baby Daddy-y-y” Yamada Komari sang.  
  
“Stop that” he smirked, “What’s up? I meant to call you, my first day back was hectic though. I assume you got back safely?”  
  
“Yea, we’re, um, avoiding Tsuyukasa for a while…”  
  
What? “Why…?”  
  
“Uh, according to my dad, we’re not really…in good standing there right now because we kept the mission and didn’t tell anyone we were alive?” Komari drawled.  
  
The hell? “…So they just…expected you to say ‘fuck it’ to our mission and sacrifice what efforts we _could_ complete while suffering in the desert? Like, did they watch our programs?”  
  
“Bro, this is not a smart town, they probably just heard the part where we were alive and didn’t tell anyone.”  
  
So just…super ignorant. “You’re welcome to come stay with us, Komari. I know my parents wouldn’t mind.”  
  
Well…it’d be pressing it after his nearing confession to eloping but maybe it could be a nice distraction. Komari pulled away to talk. Oh wait, oops. She laughed when she returned, “Yea, that’s a negative, my guy.”  
  
“Yea, I forgot Itoh” he snickered. “At least come stay in Hondo for a bit then. I have someone I really would like for you to meet.”  
  
“I guess we have enough for fare and a hostel or something.”  
  
Making a face, Shin wanted to insist that Itoh just let them stay at the mansion. It was huge, they’d rarely even see them! Lyla suddenly touched his hand, startling him. “The pool house.”  
  
…Oh, hell. Raising a brow, Shin drawled, “…We have a…quote on quote ‘pool house’. Except my parents…never got a pool which I guess was the previous developer’s plan. The twins used to just use it for their party’s facilities for bathroom and…more personal time but I don’t think they’ve done anything like that in the years they’ve been at college. It’s not much but it’ll have you two away from us?”  
  
It honestly just looked like a shed. It had a bathroom, one room where the bed and a small sofa were, and in that same room was a bar with a tiny refrigerator. It was super forgettable and none of the siblings fought to get the place, as he’d seen happen in one of those American sitcoms. The television shows was _way_ nicer though. While he expected Komari to be reluctant, she chimed, “Hey, we’ll take it, beggars won’t be choosers in my book. We’ll probably be there by five-ish?”  
  
“Perfect. See you soon.”  
  
Clicking off, he was about to thank Lyla and tease they were already a better team. Surprisingly, she droned, “Baby Daddy, huh?”  
  
Damn it, Komari! “I-It’s just a silly nickname she calls me just to irk her girlfriend, I have never impregnated her or-or anything of that nature” he blurted.  
  
Well…sort of. Lyla snickered, “I do understand how that can cause some misunderstandings. I look forward to meeting them.”  
  
Yea, that should be interesting…he took a deep breath as they pulled into the Yagami driveway at a little after 11 in the morning. It’d be… _nice_ if everyone was away doing something but it was Sunday and his dad had taken extended time off since Shin was ‘miraculously alive’. Shin sat in the car, staring. Yea, maybe… _they_ should hide out in the pool house for a while.  
  
Lyla gripped his hand, gazing at him, “I’ll take the blame, Shin. I’ll tell them it was my idea and I coaxed you.”  
  
“…Don’t be silly” he whispered, squeezing her fingers, “…I never want to disappoint them but I’ll do anything for you. I…I will accept their upset.”  
  
With a nod, his…wow, his wife opened the door and they strode toward the front door, hand-in-hand. Okay, it was going to be quick and probably painful but…  
  
Entering the mansion, he thought he heard…yelling. Or at least raised voices. Eh? Alarmed, he quickly walked toward the source of the sound. His siblings were just casually sitting at the kitchen table, silent and not the cause of the dim, drinking coffee and tea. What? “Hey, is everything…”  
  
He trailed off. He looked into the living room where, confusingly, one Okamoto Bajiru was with what appeared to be a lawyer, and some…offstandish looking twenty year old guy. Oh buddy. Shin stared, almost in disbelief this…was how this was _actually_ going to go down.   
  
His dad was sitting on the couch next to, surprisingly, Craig and another man. His mother was standing by Lillian who looked shaken. Fuck. What was going on? Bajiru, the culprit of the scream, looked sharply to the doorway and snapped, “Where is my daughter?”  
  
Lyla wandered in behind him, her eyes half-closed, “Father.”  
  
“I…assure you, Watanabe, there is probably some _general_ reason she was out with this man early this morning” Bajiru glared.  
  
Smirking, Shin raised a brow. Oh yea, there was a general reason. ‘Watanabe’, the young man, shrugged. He seemed like just the perfect slub that Bajiru needed to keep his ‘profits’. Lyla just sighed, rubbing her temple, “…I kind of wish we came home to the other scenario.”  
  
“Versus this? Oh yea.”  
  
Bajiru’s lawyer cleared his throat, cutting his eyes at them, “Okamoto-san became…concerned about matters and made certain amendments to the maiden family’s agreement. It was originally notated that Okamoto-san would be required to produce a male heir which is simply prejudicial. Thus, we edited the will to justify that no male heir of his bloodline is required but that his daughter would only be allowed to retain the property should he declare the male heir himself. We had the amendment added and notarized last night.”  
  
Shit, shit, shit. Dana scoffed, “Yea, if _that’s_ not prejudicial, I don’t know what is.”  
  
“The previous version dictated by Lady Okamoto’s stepfather indicated the same thing” the lawyer countered drolly, “It was only amended because the man grew senile and got an older version notarized.”  
  
Oh. So a slip up. Still though, that…Shin pursed his lips, his gut twisting. If they…got it notarized last night, did that mean…? The man by Craig stood, holding a file, “I will remind you all that notarizations made after three, in our current jurisdiction’s law, do not go into effect until the next day.”  
  
“As we did so” the lawyer shrugged.  
  
“Which I find unlikely, given that several flight and security logs indicate Okamoto Bajiru was in the sky at that time.”  
  
Ooh. Bajiru’s lawyer looked shocked as apparently Craig’s lawyer held up the paperwork, “Fortunately, I don’t have to issue a compliance case as your paperwork does clearly indicate 6:30. That, however, means whatever you amended was not fact until eight this morning.”  
  
 _Thank God_. Shin gripped his chest, relieved, as Bajiru shivered before barking, “What does any of that matter? It’s a fact now and I am retrieving my daughter and my wife.”  
  
Dana looked at the young man absently. “…You didn’t want to marry someone you might actually want to take time to know?”  
  
Watanabe shrugged. “…Didn’t really see a reason to do all that work.”  
  
Wow. His dad was rubbing his face…and he swore he heard the man mutter lowly, ‘if this isn’t some rich people shit’. Craig smirked at him widely in almost confirmation that the off color statement had been made. Lillian shook her head, standing, “Bajiru…it’s over. You-you can have the house, I don’t care. Lyla is by no means going to marry someone you choose.”  
  
“If we can get that in writing, the engagement is cancelled” the lawyer agreed.  
  
God, it felt so tingly. Shin waved a hand, “…No need, Okamoto-san.”  
  
Lillian looked to them, confused, as Lyla smiled at her mother, “By _yesterday’s_ will and our documents from last night with last night’s date, the house doesn’t belong to either of you. It belongs to Shin.”  
  
What a fucking chess move. Bajiru stared at them hard for a moment before his jaw started to tick, “…What is that supposed to mean?”  
  
“The paperwork said that you were supposed to provide a male heir within twenty years. Prejudicial or not, that was the requirement to maintain leadership of the household. You failed, thus ownership goes to the spouse of your oldest or only daughter…and, as of last night, that’s me” Shin replied, crossing his arms.  
  
“…You _bitch_ ” snapped Bajiru, almost seeming to start at Lyla.  
  
Shin wished his ass _would_. Lyla looked…calm. “He’s my husband, father. I know you: you’ll challenge it in court. You can. But everything will check out. Shin and I went to the courthouse to get married to make sure you lost this property. It just so happens I wanted to be with him too.”  
  
Lyla… “T-This marriage is a sham!” cursed Bajiru, he green eyes ablaze.  
  
“You literally were just going to force your daughter to marry some guy you just found yesterday” Dana said dryly.  
  
“Stay out of this!”  
  
“Oh no, sweetie, you’re in _my_ house with this bull” Dana said shortly, crossing her arms as well, “See? That’s the difference between us, _neighbor_ : this is just as much _my_ house as it is Yamada’s. Unfortunately for you, you didn’t bother to fund that foundation and it sounds like if you try to go back next door, you’re in my _son’s house_ with this bull. You are officially null and void.”  
  
Basil snarled and, ‘I Wish a Fucker Would’, Mr. Chaos made his way into the room. “There a problem, mom?”  
  
“No, dear. They’ll be leaving” Dana assured Koji.  
  
Bajiru was shaking. He was outnumbered. His lawyer and Watanabe appeared uncomfortable, staring at their feet. Surprisingly the man looked to Yamada and hissed, “…You act as if this is so simple, like you’d let your daughter just marry anyone.”  
  
“Sir, I’ve known this man for twenty plus years and he won’t even let me introduce my son to his daughter” Craig snorted, “Meanwhile you’re just drawing characters out of a hat in order to keep a house you have no right to, the societal equivalency of marrying ‘just anyone’. You’re not alike.”  
  
“I kept that property for the last two decades!! I made sure the finances were sorted, that the servants were paid, that the trusts were maintained! It is _my property_!!”  
  
Yamada smiled, sipping his coffee, his arm stretched across the back of their expansive couch, his legs crossed. It was kind of in that moment Shin exactly understood why their mom made sly comments about Koji being like their dad because Shin had absolutely _no idea_ what was about to come out of his mouth but he just had this inkling it’d be out of control.  
  
“Sorry, you’ll have to redirect comments back to the pureblood one with the fallen house. I’m just the half-breed pauper she had all these quarterbreeds with.”  
  
Well, shit. “Shut the hell up, Yamada” Dana leered before her eyes brightened, “Oh, wait, that wasn’t Yama that said that…that was _you_.”  
  
Bajiru blanched as Dana held her hands out as if unfolding a meal, “To think! You worked _so hard_ to put up appearances with this family you despise, labeling them as ‘ugly’ and ‘unfit’ and keeping them in close quarters. Why, you’re married to this woman you don’t even find attractive to the point you, a low-level botanist, go on _oh so many_ trips. Meanwhile, you terrorize your wife and daughter verbally and physically when it gets too out of hand for your taste. ‘Oh, I do oh so much to keep this _million dollar property I have no stake in_ in order! Oh, so much I’ve sacrificed!’”  
  
Shin stared, wide-eyed, as his mother glared daggers, “Meanwhile, next door, you have a father that overcame actual obstacles and a mother from a ‘fallen house’ that had to work their way up to this against all oppression. _Next door_. In a house about the same size without legacy or any of that crap—no offense to Craig, who never undermined his family and continues to work despite legacy.”  
  
Craig simply waved his hand as Dana continued, “It eats you up inside that we’re next door to you without the…sacrifice of being with people you don’t care about, as sickening as that is. And happily, at that! It isn’t even just the…half-breed and defying my family’s credence that bothers you, Okamoto, it’s that we did it and it worked out. Roderick-san?”  
  
“A-Ah, yes?” answered Craig’s lawyer, seeming mesmerized.  
  
“How long until Shin has ownership of the house next door?”  
  
“Oh, uh, about thirty days. With a court challenge, perhaps sixty.”  
  
“Twenty years of conniving undone in sixty days. How appropriate” Dana drawled before smiling, “I recommend you start looking for a new place to live and sign those divorce papers I’m working with your wife on when they’re issued to you. Shin, I recommend you have the servants pack Lyla and Lillian’s things in case someone gets any smart ideas in the median.”  
  
“A-Ah, yes…” Holy shit.  
  
Lyla grasped his hand, quiet, before nodding, “I’ll take care of that.”  
  
Nodding, he kissed her temple as she walked away. Bajiru barked, “You stay out of that house!!”  
  
“A-As Roderick said, Yagami Shin isn’t an official executor until thirty days from now” blurted Bajiru’s lawyer, panicked.  
  
“I should think Bajiru will manage without women’s clothing. If he can’t, he can go get his own” Craig remarked sarcastically.  
  
Lillian stood, folding her hands before her, pretty much the same as Dana would sometimes. She looked…lost. “…Shin.”  
  
“A-Ah, yes?”  
  
“Despite what my husband thinks, I am well aware of my family’s trust fund and the amount we have available. My stepfather, for all his faults, had us sign a prenuptial agreement to avoid this…mongering to an extent.”  
  
Bajiru’s face was turning red. Shin nodded slowly as Lillian swallowed, “…If it is an acceptable offer to him, I would like to offer two million to forego any back and forth in court. If that’s acceptable.”  
  
Yea, this was the part Shin was _not_ on board for, the asking _him_ who had about as much right to this money as a bird in the sky if it was acceptable how she spent her family money. “I don’t see why not…”  
  
“Why would I except a paltry two million when I’m entitled to it all?”  
  
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Koji bite his lip, seeming amused. What was funny about that?! Turning his head more, he saw the absolutely and incredibly incredulous expression on his dad’s face. Oh. Bajiru’s lawyer looked a bit…skeptical. “…Okamoto-san, I recommend you…perhaps should accept that offer.”  
  
“Whose side are you on?” Bajiru snapped.  
  
“Well, the one where you receive _anything_. I would be a discredit to you if I told you that in a civil matter such as this you had a 50/50 chance given they’ve accounted for the will’s criteria. It’s a 70/30 at best with you on the losing end. You can and most likely will walk out of this with nothing.”  
  
“You’re fired.”  
  
His lawyer just threw his hands up, nodding his head, “Thank you for accepting me into your home, I’ll take my leave.”  
  
Dana nodded her head in return as the man walked away. Watanabe yawned, standing, “Well, seems like my work here is done too. Thanks for the tea.”  
  
Shin smiled awkwardly at…the last pseudo-fiance of Lyla’s he’d ever meet as he walked out the door. Wow. Lillian stared soberly at Bajiru who was gritting his teeth. “…You have a decent job, Bajiru. And two million will buy you a very comfortable home. I am simply asking that you let go before you leave with nothing.”  
  
“How dare you--” he snapped, actually reaching at her.  
  
Shin grabbed his wrist hard, glaring hotly. “…You need to go. I don’t think we have anything further to discuss here.”  
  
Snatching his wrist away, he screamed, “I’m not going anywhere!”  
  
“Bitch-h-h” Koji sang, Nelly meandering behind him with his arms crossed, “We don’t need cops here, motherfucker, we’ll _gladly_ throw you out. I recommend as your second to final warning that you locate the door and get your ass on the other side of it.”  
  
He was seething. In some…vague way, Shin got it. He put all of his eggs into this very comfortable basket he thought he had a complete grasp and control over only for someone to neatly snatch it away. Too bad it was someone else’s basket. Literally…all he had to do was be a decent person and _no one_ would try to be kicking him out or divorcing him. Hell, Shin didn’t want that house, if he was just ‘good ol’ dad’, he’d let him and Lillian live there for the rest of their lives with no problem. Instead, he…took a very limited way.  
  
Craig made a face. “…You’re into plants so you’re not a numbers man, I see. If you are not taking Lillian’s _very generous_ offer, you need to remove yourself from this vicinity. If you can’t see why that’s a good idea, that’s because you are tremendously and outrageously outnumbered right now. My lawyer is also here to acknowledge that one more warning, and you’re _trespassing_ thus the Yagami can remove you since they feel _threatened_. _Leave_.”  
  
Tuh, threatened indeed. Bajiru solemnly stared at Lillian before _finally_ marching out of the house. The rest of the kids entered, looking shocked. Shaun’s brown eyes were wide. “Wow, that was intense.”  
  
“And hopefully nothing like any conversations we’ll have to have in the future” Dana scoffed.  
  
Shin hoped but somehow he doubted it. His dad was squeezing the bridge of his nose as Craig smiled at him teasingly, “You okay, man, or still caught on the two mill being a ‘paltry amount’?”  
  
“What have I gotten myself into…?” Yamada droned.  
  
Yea, two million seemed…like a very large and valid amount of money to offer someone that deserved nothing. Dana stared at her husband absently before walking toward the opening to leave the living room where Shin and the kids were standing. Maybe…all that was a little too close to home and she was remembering things could have been far different. About to offer ‘thanks’ and insist things were better now…instead, the woman grabbed him _hard_ by the earlobe. “A-Ahh!”  
  
“I was in labor with you for _seven hours_. _Seven hours_. And you have the audacity—as my _first child I spent seven hours in labor with—to get married without me there?_ ”  
  
Oh, _fuck_. “M-Mama, i-it was such a ru-rushed thing and you heard! We-We had to do it quick!”  
  
She just ‘hmph’d!’, released him, and marched away, going upstairs. Nelly snickered, “Well, glad I got to see you on the receiving end of the death grasp at least once.”  
  
Man… Jill’s eyes were aglow, “You and nee-san are really married, Shin?”  
  
“Yea…we…we figured it out last night with some help and, um, figured we needed to get it done right away.”  
  
“Good thing you did” Koji scoffed, “Bajiru tried quick and fast. If you tried to get married an hour ago, you would have been shit out of luck.”  
  
Yamada glanced at his watch a little weirdly, like he wasn’t even looking at the time but just something not to direct his stare at any of them. “…Well, I’m short a few Christmas presents. Wanna come with, Craig?”  
  
“Oh yea, sure.”  
  
“You boys got the house in case Bajiru gets any crazy ideas?”  
  
“Naturally” Koji yawned.  
  
Yamada nodded and just…basically left without really actually addressing him. Oh God, dad was mad too!! Gripping his head, he sobbed, “I would have called everyone but it was so late, I wouldn’t have made it!”  
  
“What’s even the big deal? It wasn’t even a wedding-wedding” Tony snorted.  
  
“Yea, if your ho ass ever gets married, try to do so without telling our parents and see what happens” snickered Koji, walking back into the kitchen.  
  
Lillian shrugged, awkwardly sitting back down, “…I’d rather it be this way but I suppose the selfish part of me would have liked to see my only child wed…”  
  
Oh God, Lillian too! “I-I’m sorry, Lillian, really—if it were possible, I’d say we can go down there right now and do it all over again but I don’t know where that would put us in current standing.”  
  
His only little sister raised a brow, “…I mean, that wasn’t what you and nee-san are considering your _wedding_ , right? All it was was standing in an office and being married by an official, right?”  
  
“Yea…”  
  
“Then what’s the big deal? You’re having a _real_ wedding, right?”  
  
Nelly leaned against the doorway, shrugging, “Some people don’t need a ‘real wedding’, Jill. What Shin did is enough because it’s not the event that’s important.”  
  
“Boy howdy, look at ol’ Mr. Pragmatic over here” Koji chastised, putting him in a headlock.  
  
Jill frowned as the twins wrestled, shaking her head, “W-Well, I know _that_ , of course! But if you didn’t intend to have a wedding, that does mean you got married without all of us and-and if that’s the case, I feel sad too!”  
  
Shrugging, Shaun went for the refrigerator, “Plus, mama’s career is weddings. While it’s an unnecessary waste of money, it is a big deal to her and definitely was a big deal to see her first kid get married, I bet.”  
  
Right…feeling cloyingly bad, he bit his lip. “I’m…I’m going to go talk to mama real fast.”  
  
Yeesh…exhausted by all of this, he walked up the steps, hearing the clack and hum of her sewing machine. Going to her work room, he watched as she worked with her back to the door on a cream colored gown. Man, Shaun was so damn right, his mom’s gig was weddings, what the hell… Knocking, he swallowed as she didn’t answer. She was pissed.  
  
“…I, uh, lost Sweetie Plum status on this one, I bet.”  
  
He groaned as she just snorted, still steady sewing, “…I’m so sorry, mama. I-I should have recognized how important this was to you and dad, seeing…seeing your kid get married is important to you both, I’m sure. I…”  
  
…Who was he kidding? He had a bit of time to tell them to get down there fast if they wanted to be involved. Blushing, he shuffled his feet as he stuffed his hands in his pockets, “…I just really wanted her to be my wife without…without her having to see her mother suffer in exchange.”  
  
Not like…they had. Dana ended the stitch she was on, her shoulders dropping back as she sighed, exasperated. “Look, Shin, I’m sure I’m being irrational. I know I am. We were almost in your exact shoes when we got married, everyone was going to want to stop us or get me married off to someone else. Time was slightly of the essence and we did it quick, fast, and in a hurry. I just never would have guessed my children would find themselves in the same place.”  
  
Shin grimaced as she turned to look at him, her eyes a bit watery. Oh _God, she was crying_. “Mama…” he choked, rushing to her and hugging her, “I’m _sorry_. I’m _so sorry._ ”  
  
“Stop it” she grunted, embracing his neck, “I told you I’m being _stupid_. I just…I just had hoped after your dad and I had parents that not only didn’t care who we wanted to marry but would have stopped us every step that we’d get to watch you all get married happily. It’s not your fault or Lyla’s that the other side hindered that for us. Neither of you should have been forced on the spot to get married to keep her father from being an insufferable asshat.”  
  
Yes… “A-After I get secured with work and everything, I-I want us to have a wedding. Like, the actual shindig. Y-You can plan it if you want.”  
  
Dana smirked widely, smacking his arm, “Young man, you have a _wife_ now and if your father promised that to his mother, I’d beat him black and blue.”  
  
“I wouldn’t mind.”  
  
Shin jumped, startled as Lyla appeared at the entry, looking apprehensive. “I’m sorry to overhear. I just heard from the kids that you were upset. Shin was dreading telling you, he…he knows how important this must have been to you all. I wouldn’t mind at all if you planned our wedding, especially after all the trouble I’ve caused you.”  
  
Clucking her tongue, Dana held out her arms to Lyla. She came over shyly and Dana hugged her tightly, “Both of you stop being silly. You’ve caused no trouble that I wouldn’t want to annihilate due to my own experiences. And I want you to have the wedding that you want and I just want to be there. I’m so glad to have you as my first daughter-in-law, Lyla. Congratulations to you both.”  
  
Mama…Lyla bit her lip, looking hopeful, “But-But you’ll make my gown, won’t you?”  
  
Dana looked startled, “Well, I mean, darling, I’m sure you can have any designer you please--”  
  
“And I want it to be Yagada” Lyla pouted, “I’ll pay you, of course.”  
  
“Knock it off. Of…of course I’ll make it.”  
  
Shin smiled as his mother looked delighted, gushing about designs and whatnot with Lyla. Good, good…that felt better. Now, his dad. “Mama, dad’s upset with me too…should I just let it play out?”  
  
“Oh, I doubt he’s upset over the wedding” his mother shook her head, “He’s probably just shaken his baby has grown up and is married. He’ll be fine when he gets back.”  
  
Oh. Nodding softly, his eyes burning, Shin whispered, “O-Okay. Um, K-Komari and her girlfriend are coming, mama. Apparently, their hometown thinks they’re villainous for not telling them they were alive this whole time.”  
  
Dana raised a brow, “…Well, that’s ridiculous. You offered them a place to stay?”  
  
“Ah, yes. I’m going to go clean the pool house for them.”  
  
His mother stared at him, baffled, before realization entered her dark eyes and she gawked, “…Oh, sweetie, we had that knocked down while you were away. It had water damage.”  
  
Oh, hell. He was so out of it, he probably didn’t even register its absence. Dana stood, patting Lyla’s hands, “If the girlfriend doesn’t feel comfortable staying inside with us, we’ll get something thrown up really fast. I know some man specializing in pod houses or something strange.”  
  
“Oh no, mom, that sounds like an inconvenience and I can’t ask that you spend that--”  
  
“Oh, it will be a paltry _less_ than two million” she joked, “And he owes me a favor. Lyla, darling, you think about colors and cuts. We’ll discuss design after I get this done.”  
  
God, his mama. “T-Thank you so much, mama. I…I don’t know what I’ve done to deserve any of you.”  
  
Certainly not after all he’d been responsible for. His mother huffed, pulling him down to kiss his forehead, “Stop that, _Sweetie Plum_. Take Nelly and Koji and get our tree, please.”  
  
“Yes, mom” he smiled.  
  
Lyla looked after her with a smile as well, her eyes soft. “Do you regret it?”  
  
“Nope.”  
  
“You answered too fast” she said sulkily, turning to him.  
  
“Because I don’t” he smiled, hugging her tight, “Would I have done differently? Absolutely. But the end result would be the same. I love you.”  
  
Kissing him, she purred, “…Can the tree wait for just a few minutes?”  
  
He grinned, glancing over his shoulder and backing them toward the steps, “Oh yea…”  
  
…What a good day.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
“God _dang_ , did it used to take this long to decorate this bastard?”  
  
Nelly was almost slinging the glass ornaments at the nine foot tree, shaking his head in dismay. Koji was standing back, his head tilted, “…Maybe? I think we were more excited about it as kids.”  
  
“Yea, the feeling is very quickly fading, I have to say” Shaun droned, leaving after placing five ornaments.  
  
After a quick…rendezvous with his wife, Shin went downstairs to advise the twins they were instructed to get the tree. Of course, he wanted to wait until their dad got home in case, as he had said, Bajiru got any slick ideas. Koji had raised a brow _“Tony and Shaun will be here. I mean, we’re not going to be gone long”._

The _babies?_ Tony smirked, “ _We’re not lethal like Koji but we can pack a punch, nii-san, damn_.”  
  
Oh…okay. Reluctantly, he headed out with the two and they were able to locate this giant tree and bring it back within about forty minutes after having it delivered. Now…? Yea, decorating it was turning into a task.   
  
The doorbell suddenly rang and they all looked up, eyes narrowing. Lillian, exhausted after this stressful day, was napping and Lyla had gone out with Tony and Jill to go shopping. His mom was overseeing the guest house arrangements with their dad. As she said, the man returned and acted like nothing had happened but congratulated him… _“Dad, I…”  
  
“We’ll talk later, son. I had wanted to have the ‘husband talk’ before you got married but things have to move fast around our parts, I see.”  
  
_Yea, seriously. And Bajiru might have wanted to pull a fast one too. Stalking to the door, prepared for a fight, Shin yelped when he got punched in the shoulder hard upon opening it. Well, maybe not _that_ prepared.  
  
“You motherfucking son of a bitch.”  
  
Shin gaped, shocked to find Akiyama Joe standing there, staring at him in disbelief. “…Dude!”  
  
“Oh, you’re surprised to see _me_?” Joe laughed dryly, “Imagine _my_ surprise when you’ve been labeled dead and aren’t _fucking dead_.”  
  
“Oh my God, _Jyou_ , it is such a long story…” Shin rasped, shaking his hand. He…hadn’t gotten in contact with his friends yet, crap.  
  
Joe clapped him on the same shoulder he just assaulted, Shin’s bad shoulder, naturally. “I’m just messing with you, man, I am…fucking _stoked_. You good?”  
  
“…Definitely better nowadays” Shin smiled some.  
  
Joe’s thick auburn eyebrows furrowed but he looked back. Ah! Aden Bjerke and Sonja Piehl entered, wide-eyed, “…Fuck-k-k, it was real?”  
  
“Aden, Sonja! Oh my God, guys, things-things have been a madhouse since I got back, I have seriously meant to reach out, just—I just got back from Iraq--”  
  
Aden shook his hand firmly, scowling, “Which was literally the fucking _craziest thing_ any of us had ever heard if the first part of your story was true.”  
  
Sonja clasped his hand, nodding rapidly, “Y-Yes, it was _all_ the talk of the base.”  
  
“Oh, it’s just Joe.”  
  
Shin glanced over his shoulder as Koji appeared, drinking a beer, with Nelly. Joe grinned, heckling, “The trouble twins.”  
  
The doorbell rang again and Shin was…almost overwhelmed. Opening the door, he was there when Komari appeared with Kasumi who looked cross. “Yagami-i-i-i!”  
  
“Hey, Yamada” he smiled, fist tapping with her, “You are…magnificently just in time.”  
  
“That’s me. Hey, Aden, Sonja, right?” greeted Komari, taking off her boots.  
  
Aden, Sonja, and Joe probably tried not to directly stare but it was unfortunately difficult to overlook initially. Shin smiled quickly, “Yea, that’s right. And Komari, I want you to meet Akiyama Jyou. He’s the one that was doing the transfer.”  
  
“Oh, yea, Baby Daddy chick” Joe nodded, shaking Komari’s hand.  
  
Shin smiled grimly while Kasumi’s temple started to tick, Komari _only_ amused. “Yea, that’s her.”  
  
“And this is my darling, Kasumi. She is not a happy camper right now and probably just wants to hide in this poolhouse you have with no pool.”  
  
“Yea…about that. I was hopped up so I didn’t notice it was gone. My mom and dad are overseeing a pod getting put in as we speak.”  
  
Komari stared at him, bewildered, “…A pod?”  
  
“Oh yea, it’s pretty neat. It’s just like the pool house so you two will be very comfortable. Just a few more hours though, I’m sorry” Shin explained.  
  
Joe smirked while Komari just looked at him in horror. What?? “…Yagami, the fact that you kept us alive bewilders me the most when you act like a _fucking rich kid_.”  
  
“Wha??”  
  
“Whose family just throws up a new guest house because they have guests coming, Shin?!”

Huh. Shin patted his cheek while Koji rubbed his chin. “Shit…that is kind of a money flex. Wow. When you really think you’re well-grounded.”  
  
Komari just groaned, shaking her head while the others snickered. Well, oops. “Well…I’d rather you…still stay, Komari, Itoh-san, it’s…kind of a lot of ask my parents just to cancel at this junction.”  
  
“Uh, duh? Just wish it had reached the junction where you called us _before_ you built a whole new structure.”  
  
Ah well. Might be a neat newlywed suite too. Nelly glanced at his watch, tipping his head at Koji, “You ready to go run some errands?”  
  
“Mm, yea. We’ll be back in a few, Shin. You need anything?”  
  
“Oh, uh, no” Shin smiled, feeling awkward as Kasumi leered through his soul. He really thought they’d reached another level of understanding.  
  
Nelly, Trouble #2, blinked casually at…Kasumi?? “You’re welcome to go with us, Itoh-san. Shin tells us you hate his guts.”  
  
Idiot. “…I don’t believe that’s appropriate” Kasumi answered shortly.  
  
Like, seriously. She didn’t even know these miscreants at all. Komari, alas, teased, “I’m sure you could take them, baby. You should go explore Subami a bit.”  
  
What?! Kasumi sulked at her before grumbling, “…If it’s only for a few.”  
  
Koji looked to Nelly questioningly, the latter seeming semi-surprised. Well, good job, his stupid ass offered and she took it. Watching this very unlikely trio venture out into the cold December night, Shin slowly shook his head. “…I don’t know how that’s going to work out.”  
  
“Shit, I’m floored she went” Komari droned, standing beside him in the door, “She sure as fuck does hate you to go off with two unknown to her men.”  
  
Shin smirked, looking at her through narrow eyes as Aden snickered, “You two have stories…a lot of which I need to hear given last I heard your _ass was dead_! C’mon, spill!”  
  
“Okay, okay” Shin sighed, leading everyone to the living room, “Let me get some beer and I’ll tell our terrible, awful story.”  
  
Getting everyone seated with drinks, he was grateful when Sonja and Aden delighted in seeing the tree. It was…a bit of an exploitation, but he offered that they were more than free to continue decorating the tree and that no one would mind. They went about it merrily but demanded they keep talking.   
  
After about an hour of telling, just rereminded that he had no business being alive, Shin leaned back into the sofa next to Komari. He needed a shot. Aden and Sonja had sat down, holding their beers kind of loosely while Joe took a steady chug. Rasping as he pulled the bottle from his lip, he slowly shook his head. “…Shit, man.”  
  
“Yagami, Yamada…that’s insane and brutal” gaped Aden, “And…and they were just like, ‘okay, cool, you guys can go back, sure thing’?”  
  
“I mean, we weren’t forced or anything” Komari shrugged.  
  
Joe scoffed, “Dude, I watched those reports. Those assholes were tearing you a new one. But if you came out with this full story, I can tell you they wouldn’t have. And they’d be pissed the army just sent you _war tired_ back, no matter if you went back on your own accord or not.”  
  
Shin shrugged, drawling, “…I can’t speak for Mari but I dunno if I’d call it ‘war tired’.”  
  
“Battle blistered, maybe” Komari mused, tapping the neck of her beer to her lip.  
  
“Look…look, no hurt or disrespect intended, but you fucking lost a limb. You lost a limb because an army pilot took you off course and got you shot down so that you had to trek through thousands of miles of hellfire desert or…die? The army needs to name a base after you two and give you full pension, not-not offer for you to _keep your jobs_ , what the fuck?!” Joe snapped.  
  
Biting his lip, Shin mused. Well… Komari sat up, folding her hands. “I hear ya’, bro, really. And…honestly, I only had retirement on the table. I think we were offered decent pensions. But…Shin made a point out there. We do…good work. Fuck, what we were able to just accomplish was just as big as what we did in the desert. I was down for the count and ready to cast myself out too but Shin’s right: we were made for this shit and…as softhearted and stupid patriotic as it sounds? I don’t think we were meant to sit the rest of this out after that.”  
  
… “No. I don’t think so either” Shin nodded, “Battle blistered, war tired, shellshocked, PTSD stroked. Whatever the case may be, I didn’t see what I saw in the desert to come home and sit back comfortably. The other two that did so? I’m happy for them. But it’s not for me.”  
  
“And I told this crazy man if he got us anywhere but dead out of that desert, I’d follow him to Hell and here we are” Komari joked. “I don’t mind it.”  
  
“You two are really good then” Joe groaned.  
  
“Good?” laughed Aden dryly, “You’re on some superhero shit, you mean? I’m just…awed. Sato was full of _shit_.”  
  
Komari looked startled. “You know Sato?”  
  
“Mm, he was our instructor at basic training” Aden nodded, drinking.  
  
“Dude, you had bad blood with Sato from the start??” Komari gawked.  
  
Shin sighed, scratching the side of his face, “Yea…”  
  
“Wait, Sato was over there with you?” Aden gasped.

He supposed it was a bit…weird to speak only of the military but it was something they definitely all had in common. Aden and Sonja updated that they were deployed to Fenith Island. Sonja communicated to Aden on his essentially mecha what she was seeing on their satellite and GPS. While there, they met Joe who was apparently guarding the waters. While he assumed that was just a hundred percent bullshit to throw off the army, Joe assured that the Zechs tried to infiltrate Fenith from the water too…oh boy.  
  
“You know…” Komari said, frowning, “…I got so caught up, I just noticed it’s been two damn hours. Where the hell is Sumi?”  
  
Eh? Shin quickly looked to the clock over the fireplace and did a double take. Holy crap! And where was his wife too?! “U-Uh, I’ll-I’ll call Koji and ask if she’s okay.”  
  
Komari nodded and continued chattering with the others. First thing, though… “Hello?”  
  
“H-Hey, baby, it’s been a little while, I’m just checking on you” he murmured.

Lyla gasped, “Oh, I’m sorry, Shin, we were getting distracted. I promise I’m okay.”  
  
“Good, good. I…I don’t mean to be a worrywart” he murmured, going to get out the biggest rice maker to start a pot.  
  
“I know” she gushed, “I’ll be home soon, promise. I love you.”  
  
“I love you too” he smiled, grabbing a bag from the cupboard.  
  
Man, he could definitely stand to be cuddled up or in a…precarious position with his wife right now. Ah well, soon, maybe. Calling Koji next, he expected to hear…well, he wasn’t sure. It sure wasn’t that weird electronica song. ‘Sandstorm’ came to mind but maybe because of the conversation he just had. Irregardless, what the fuck?! “…Koji!”  
  
“Heyyy, bro!”  
  
“Where the hell are you with Itoh?!” he hissed, getting further away so Komari didn’t hear.  
  
“She’s doing fine! She’s doing shots right now!!”  
  
Shin stared as he indeed heard ‘shots’ being sang in the background. It was…a little after _seven o’clock_. He…wasn’t familiar with Itoh’s loud nor drunk voice but it sounded like her that said ‘another round!’. “… _Koji_. I…really, really need you to listen to me: _bring her home.”  
  
_ “I will, dummy!”  
  
Sucking his cheek as Koji ended casually with ‘by nine’ and hung up, Shin rubbed his face hard. Woah boy. Starting the side dish for dinner, her absently walked back into the living room and smiled. “…Um, she is…barely tolerating their presence but they promise they’ll be back shortly?”  
  
“My poor baby” Komari gasped, grabbing her phone, “Maybe I should go get her. She does get anxious in weird situations, I should have been more upfront that I was joking.”  
  
“Okay, I’m sorry, I lied: they’re in a club somewhere taking shots” he groaned loudly.  
  
His best friend stared at him weirdly. “…So you…lead with the plausible story and then recant with the impossible story to…confuse me?”  
  
“Yea, I just…thought one sounded better than the other, so…”  
  
Raising a brow, Komari tapped her fingers against the back of the sofa where her arm was stretched, “…Maybe I should still go get her. She gets kind of crazy on booze.”  
  
“And she is definitely in good company for that…” Shin snorted.  
  
Komari seemed to be deliberating before she looked…worried. “…You…trust your brothers, right?”  
  
“…Yes.”  
  
“…I’m anxious” Komari muttered, “But this…if this isn’t a misunderstanding, that’s really good that she’s out having a good time with other people, _especially_ other guys. Like, I want her to get better about opening her horizons.”  
  
Nodding, Shin resumed his place beside her, “I’ll keep a check on them but Koji and Nelly are pretty committed that they take care of their company. She might be _wasted_ when she gets here but she’ll be in one piece.”  
  
Joe was rubbing his chin, gazing at them with a raised brow, “I think I get why the girlfriend hates your guts, bro, you’re awfully chummy and intimate. You two fucked?”  
  
“He got in a few strokes before the drugs kicked in” Komari nodded.  
  
“Will you _stop it_?” he leered, shaking his head while he drank.  
  
Aden snickered as Sonja laughed, her feet rested in the former’s lap, “When we first met Komari, I thought you two were screwing around. It wouldn’t surprise me.”  
  
“I can be _friends_ with a woman, thank you” Shin sulked.  
  
With a gasp, Komari shook his arm, “Dude!! Where is she?! You said she’d be here!”  
  
“She went shopping with my brother and sister. I’m sure she’ll be home soon” Shin smiled.  
  
“Who, Lyla?” echoed Joe, “I thought you hated her guts, what happened?”  
  
Pursing his lips, Shin blinked some. What happened…? “…Honestly? Being out there in the desert, thinking about how I might never see her again? It…probably was one of the top four things that got me out of there. And we resolved all that. You were right, there…was a reason for all of it.”  
  
One that was thankfully resolved. Joe smirked, “Well, I’m happy for you and disappointed I didn’t try to tap her in the interim.”  
  
“I’ll punch your damn lights out” Shin said dryly.  
  
“See how sweet Shin is about his lady?” Sonja teased.  
  
Aden laughed, “Oh yea.”  
  
Shin smiled, looking up when the deck door opened and his dad walked in. “Oh! Hello, everyone. Joe, how’s your grandfather?”  
  
“Probably drunk as a fish, sir” Joe nodded proudly, standing and shaking Yamada’s hand.  
  
His dad groaned, looking absent, “…Well, Bacchus was drunk most of my childhood so I guess it’s okay.”  
  
Shin raised a brow. Was it? “Ah, dad, I don’t think you got a chance to meet my other good friends, Aden and Sonja. Sonja, Aden, this is my dad, Yagami Yamada.”  
  
“Ah, you both called for Shin. It’s nice to finally meet you” he bowed.  
  
“O-Oh, you as well, sir!” Sonja blurted.  
  
Aden smirked some but nodded, “I’m glad we’re meeting under much better circumstances, sir.”  
  
“Ha, definitely. And Ms. Yamada, I take it you’re taking care of edema with your new prosthetic?”   
  
Komari smiled, wide-eyed, “…Uh, is that…supposed to be something done… with a false leg, sir?”  
  
“ _Ed_ ema, Komari” Shin leaned over to whisper, “Swelling.”  
  
“Oh! Like a water balloon, sir!”  
  
While that was _not_ good, Shin had to cough not to crack up along with the others at her chipper tone and his father’s blank expression. “…Let me check.”  
  
She followed him without complaint and Shin chuckled, tilting his head, “C’mon, I’m getting dinner ready.”  
  
The others followed him into the kitchen while he decided chicken curry would be the best for the amount of guests they had. Sonja elbowed Aden, swaying, “Look! He cooks too!”  
  
“I cook!”  
  
“Barely!”  
  
Shin sighed, dicing carrots, “Are you two ‘off’ again?”  
  
“Surprisingly, no” Aden scoffed, turning his bottle in his hands, “But you’re lucky your dad’s not single, she’d probably be skulking around him.”  
  
Sonja dragged down her eyelid. Shin’s eyebrows furrowed, “My dad?”  
  
“She loves tall, blond, blue-eyed men” he rolled his eyes.  
  
Joe laughed, stretching, “One out of three ain’t bad, bro.”  
  
Punching at Joe’s shoulder, Aden grunted, “Asshole. I always thought Japanese people were shorter. Lo and behold I meet the only two behemoths on the island.”  
  
With a grin, Joe winked, “Whoever the fuck my old man was was some European wank that fucked my mom for a week and went back to jolly old England.”  
  
“My dad’s half-American and apparently his dad’s taller than he is” yawned Shin.  
  
Sonja gasped, “Oh, did you guys have to raise your sinks?”  
  
“Yea, now, you all’s sinks and toilets are hella low, I will say that” Aden droned.  
  
Huh. Shin paused to ponder as Joe looked thoughtful, “…I think because Wasaba was built during the Euro-American craze, our stuff isn’t quite the same…scale. Especially this house, man, I bet your mom is the uncomfortable one here.”  
  
“My mom’s not _that_ short, dingbat.”  
  
“Who’s calling me short?”  
  
Dana came in, wearing a puffer coat, weirdly…plebeian for his mother somehow. Joe grinned as she ruffled his hair, drawling, “Hello, Jyou. I’d ask how your grandpa is but I already know. Tell him to quit it.”  
  
“Yes, ma’am.”  
  
“Oh, mama, these are my friends, Aden and Sonja. We were all in the army together” Shin nodded.  
  
“Oh! Nice to meet you both!” Dana gushed, shaking their hands, “Will you be staying with us?”  
  
Aden shook his head, “We probably shouldn’t. We have a little leeway with the holiday but we have to still check in due to an…increasing number of AWOL soldiers.”  
  
Eh? “Oh, that’s crazy. Well, if you two are given the opportunity, I welcome you to. We have a very nice pod home now.”  
  
Shin frowned as she came over to stir the miso, “Oh, it’s done? Komari was kind of…shocked we took the effort and felt bad.”  
  
“It’s perfect, especially if my newlywed decides he wants to have a little privacy” Dana teased, glancing at her watch, “Oh, I need to make a call, I’ll be right back!”  
  
Smiling grimly as she left, he felt the eyes of his peers stabbing into the back of his head. Joe cleared his throat, “…Newlywed?”  
  
“…It’s a very long story that I will wait for Komari to return for.”  
  
Which was far too soon as not two minutes later, Komari came down the steps with his dad, the man wearing a blazer. “Your meal smells amazing, son, but I promised to have dinner with Matsushima and his wife.”  
  
“Oh, that’s fine, dad” Shin blinked, “I’m sure between me, my friends here, and the kids, we’ll eat all of this in no time.”  
  
“Without a doubt” Aden groaned, sounding like he was suffering, “The food at base is so gross…”  
  
“Yea, I’m used to scraping by food but some of that shit isn’t even scrapin’” Joe drawled, his eyes wide.  
  
Yamada smirked as Dana came down the stairs, wearing her pea coat now. “Well, enjoy then. And Komari, I’ll bring you something for that water retention. Try to stay off of your limbs for a little bit.”  
  
Komari nodded, taking a seat beside Joe at the table, “Will do! Thank you!”  
  
The duo bid them farewell and Shin bid this calm ‘farewell’ too. Going back to the kitchen, Aden, Sonja, and Joe peering at him, he sighed, going back to the fridge to get more beer. “…Komari, Joe, Sonja, Aden…Lyla’s dad was saying racist things to me and Lyla didn’t say anything about it because he was attacking her mother. On top of physical harm, he was attempting to rob Lyla’s mother of land that belongs to her family because he wanted it for himself. Due to a sexist will Lyla’s step-grandfather drew up, it said that only a man could take account for the house. Since Bajiru didn’t have a son…”  
  
“…Oohhh” Joe sang, whistled.  
  
“Wha?” Komari scowled.  
  
Cracking the top on his fourth beer, he blinked at her, “…To keep them from losing the house, I married Lyla last night.”  
  
“… _WHAT?”  
  
_ His partner in crime gawked while he simmered the carrots and potatoes in the curry roux. “…Well shit, no invite?!”  
  
“It was super spontaneous, Komari! We just came back yesterday!”  
  
She opened her mouth but faltered, stunned, “…Holy shit, you’re right!! What, you got off the plane and popped the question?”  
  
“I got off the plane, went to get her, had a run in with her dad, removed her mother and her from the home, had someone advise me that Bajiru may take the house, got married last night to keep the house so Lyla’s mom has a place to live and that racist pompous ass doesn’t get it. Plus…I love her to the depths of my soul so yea, there’s that too.”  
  
“Aww” cooed Joe.  
  
“Shaddup.”  
  
Sonja leaned back, crossing her arms, “…I mean, not to sound discouraging, but that’s a bit of a heavy reason to get married. Everything else, that’s sweet, of course! But, like…”  
  
“I do wish it was under better circumstances” Shin assured. “And, don’t worry, because even my parents weren’t allowed to be there with the time constraints, we’re going to have a wedding and you all are invited.”  
  
Komari groaned, gazing at the ceiling, “…Jeez.”  
  
“When’s the wedding?” Aden asked, “Just make sure we’re not deployed.”  
  
“Oh, well…”  
  
The door opened and Shin smiled when Jill and Lyla entered, chattering. Well…kind of two Yagami daughters now, he supposed? Lyla looked surprised, “Oh.”  
  
“Well, hello” Joe blinked, his voice taking that flirty tone, looking at…  
  
Jill smirked, “It’s me, Joe. Jill.”  
  
“Ho-ly shit.”  
  
Shin leered lightly at him, wandering over, “As even I barely recognized her when I got back from the desert, I’ll let it pass…this time.”  
  
Snickering, Jill looked at the thin watch she was wearing, “Well, I’ll see you all later, guys.”   
  
The fuck? Shin opened his mouth to demand where she was going at…eight o’clock. Then had to reel in, once again, she was sixteen and _damn it_ , this was hard. “…Please, be safe wherever you’re going.”  
  
“I’m going somewhere with Tony, relax” Jill yawned, waving and heading back down the hall.  
  
‘With Tony’ did not make him feel any better, he was the second coming of the twins combined! Komari snickered, “Hey, ‘nii-san’, chill thinking your sister is about to be kidnapped before Christmas and introduce your wife.”  
  
Oh!! “I’m sorry. Komari, Aden, Sonja, this is Lyla. Lyla, these are my basic training buddies, Sonja Piehl and Aden Bjerke. And this is Yamada Komari who I have told you _all_ about and have presently heard address me as ‘baby daddy’. And you remember this whore, Joe.”  
  
Joe smirked, flipping him off, as Sonja gasped, “I heard so much about you but I don’t know why I wasn’t expecting a fellow pinky.”  
  
A what now? Lyla laughed, bowing, “We are rare, I think you’re the third one I’ve met. Nice to meet you all.”  
  
Oh, the hair. Aden smiled awkwardly, “Uh, Shin told us about the whole deal…I guess that’s pretty fresh so are you still flying under your maiden name or Shin’s?”  
  
…Ooh. Lyla looked thoughtful, “Oh, you can just call me ‘Lyla’. You’re right, it is pretty fresh. I will go by Yagami but it will take a second to acclimate to answer to it, I think.”  
  
Hell, it’d be hard for him too, they…were both Yagami. Blushing a bit, he wandered back to the stove to check on the food. “U-Um, have a seat, Lai, dinner will be ready in a sec.”  
  
Lyla sat beside Joe, blinking at him, “You’re looking well, Akiyama-san.”  
  
“You too” Joe sighed, “Guess you won the entire replacement best friend now.”  
  
She smirked, swatting at him, “Stop it. Shin-chan has a lot of friends.”  
  
“Actually, everyone is pretty much at this table” Shin drawled, taking a fruity wine Lyla liked out of the chiller.  
  
Komari snickered, “And a majority are army buds. What happened to your high school friends?”  
  
“I joined the army” Shin winked.  
  
“What about Louis? I mean, he’s got to be somewhat of a friend for you to fly him into a reconnaissance situation.”  
  
Drawling, Shin started to take down some dishes, “Yea-a-a-a, that’s a weird situation.”  
  
Indeed, his…wow, spouse, looked at him weirdly, “…Louis? Like the guy my dad was trying to marry me to?”  
  
“Uh, wha?” Komari droned.  
  
“He’s a nice guy!” Shin protested.  
  
Aden stared, wide-eyed, as Sonja snickered. “Men.”  
  
Lyla sighed, rubbing her forehead, “So…he helped though?”  
  
“Oh, he _hella_ helped” Komari assured, “Like, that dude is probably about to have a full decorated military career after that one. Didn’t know there was that sort of history.”  
  
Bringing over the glass of wine to Lyla, he jabbed at Komari, “I probably told you. Out of sight, out of mind.”  
  
“You do tell me a whole helluva lot of craziness” Komari laughed.  
  
“O-Oh, Shin told me you really helped him get through that whole experience in the desert” Lyla said, a hint of shyness in her voice, “Thank you. I…I was really here thinking I’d never see him again.”  
  
Lai… Komari scoffed, drinking her beer, “You let Shin tell it, I spearheaded the whole mission by myself while he was just standing around, looking dumb or something. I very much would have been dead without him so I don’t know what the fuck his problem is.”  
  
“Because I’m _also_ not Rambo and couldn’t have done it myself?” Shin countered lightly.  
  
“We’re a good team, that’s why. Uh…in a platonic way, of course.”  
  
Shaking her read rapidly, Lyla gasped, “No, I get it! Shin explained to me how special you are to him and insisted it wasn’t something he wanted me to feel jealous over. And…I mean, aside from some envy, I wouldn’t let that affect his relationship with you and hope I can get to know you well too.”  
  
Komari was quiet and Shin set a plate before her, smiling smugly, “That’s the difference between _my_ girl and yours.”  
  
He grinned, dodging as she punched at his hip, “Shaddup! I know mine has issues, she’s working on it!”  
  
“I know, I’m screwing with you. Although I am going to be more than mildly offended if she’s somehow bosom buddies with my brothers after whatever this experience is” he snorted, working his way around the table.  
  
Komari cracked up, “I’m saying. And that’d be nice, Lyla. Shin told me a lot about you too. And definitely don’t discredit yourself for getting us out of that desert either, it…was a lot of touch and go.”  
  
“That whole fucking _experience_ would have been touchy for me” Joe scoffed, swirling his bottle, “I’m just blown away, ya’ll. That’s…that’s history book shit and they just let you go back like-like normal or something.”  
  
Aden nodded glumly, “Right. It’s like…it wasn’t even _enough_.”  
  
“I’m pretty sure it was _more_ than enough” Sonja murmured.  
  
After setting out the serving bowls of rice and curry, passing out the bowls of miso, Shin silently sat down at the head of the table, Lyla at his left hand and Komari at his right, the latter staring at him solemnly. What could he actually say to that? Was it weird that they were just thrown back into the fire with PTSD and permanent physical damage? Yes. Really, it was beyond absurd.   
  
And yet, despite it all, when he heard…there were people still suffering more than he was, he put that behind him as much as he possibly could to jump back into the flames. He needed all the help he could get. Therapy, rehabilitation, possibly drugs for the rest of his life—last night, he got up and pretended to need to relieve himself to stand in the bathroom until he was coming off the plateau of a bloody nightmare. On his wedding night. Komari…would never have full mobility again, no matter how much physical therapy she did. This…took the toll from them and then some.  
  
Komari had folded her hands, smiling some as she took the bowl of rice handed to her from Sonja. “I’m not a bootlicker. I just feel…like we were put in a situation where others were actively not prepared to put forth the effort required, whether it was because they didn’t want to or just didn’t believe hard enough in the cause. I…surrendered my life a few times out in that desert but it ate at my soul every day we couldn’t help those people—we wouldn’t have even agreed to the ‘death’ lie if we didn’t care about the cause. They asked…for our lives and…like a friend of mine that didn’t make it over there, we almost paid with them.”  
  
Swallowing that, Shin nodded, “…We paid a toll. But the road ahead still has quite a few before we get to where we want to be—I think everyone at this table, whether they think so or not, is capable of paving the path.”  
  
“…The right people for the job” Aden murmured.  
  
“Damn straight” Joe smiled some.  
  
…Hmm. This could work, actually.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
“Okay, okay, okay.”  
  
Shin smirked widely at Joe who was sitting on the recliner, on his second cup of Hennessy. Lyla was curled up with him on the elongated part of the couch into his side, drinking a glass of wine with her brows furrowed while Komari sat at his other side, Aden and Sonja snuggled up on the other end. When the beer ran dry, they made a run to the liquor store before it closed to replenish. He wasn’t expecting them to get hard liquor though. He guessed he better get the guest room ready for everyone because they were all now wasted.  
  
Joe’s amber eyes were wide as he sat up straighter, his cup sloshing but staying within the glass, “So-So look, if you can believe it, ol’ rich motherfucker over there with his hot wife, he used to-to live in the fuckin’ slums. My next door neighbor until his dad hightailed it outta there in like the eighties.”  
  
“1986” Shin nodded, rubbing Lyla’s back.  
  
“Yes!” Joe pointed, “So-So we were poor as fuck, right? So we had stupid fucking games we’d play like knock knock ditch because our stupid apartment didn’t have doorbells.”  
  
Komari laughed, drinking a cocktail she made, “I can’t believe ol’ blue-eyes here was playing pranks.”  
  
“EXACTLY. Shin was always just there for the ride, he wasn’t an active participant. He was a punk!”  
  
Aden and Sonja cracked up as Shin could only smirk more, his eyes narrowing, “I was not trying to be a troublemaker while my dad was barely surviving, asshole. Didn’t mean I didn’t want to OBSERVE you and the other guys doing BS.”  
  
Lyla made a face. She was a bit chattier than usual with the three glasses of wine she’d had. “Weren’t you all like…four, five? Why were you allowed to wander around and ring doorbells—knock-- anyway?”  
  
“Because all of our parents were at work, Lyla, we didn’t HAVE supervision in the hood” Joe sighed gravely.  
  
Raising a brow, Sonja drawled, “But wait, if everyone was at work then who was the victim of the games?”  
  
“Good question” Joe nodded, mm’ing, “Here’s the thing about Wasaba though: you always had people at home. Night shifters, drug dealers—druggies. Victims were always available.”  
  
“So…you were knocking and running on druggie’s doors” Aden droned.  
  
“They were so high half the time that they didn’t care” Shin explained, holding Lyla’s hand, “Now, the drug dealers would get mad but then they’d tell us they wouldn’t beat us if we just ran down to the store and got them some cigarettes. Half the time, they let us keep the change or told us to get candy so it really worked out great.”  
  
“But those night shifters, man, they were ready to GO. Came with brooms READY” Joe shook his head, “In retrospect, I feel like an asshole for them more than anyone.”  
  
Lyla sulked, “That’s so dangerous! Where was your Yaya, Shin?”  
  
“Mm, at that point, she was busy studying to get into college. If I asked to go play with Joe, she was happy to send me” Shin shrugged.  
  
“Yaya?” Komari raised a brow, “Oh, the sister of your namesake.”  
  
“Mm! Okay, so that’s the story!” Joe redirected, setting his glass down, “I’ll never forget—Shin was a punk.”  
  
Shin snickered, “Ass.”  
  
“No, no, Shin—Shin was Mr. Do Good even at like five. The goody damn two shoes. A few of the kids were like, why do you even let him come? And I was like, why not?! But one night—one night, I had Shin stay over. I told him, tonight, Shin—tonight, we release Garin’s pigeons.”  
  
Oh God. Shin squeezed the bridge of his nose while the others chortled, Aden remarking, “Oh, this is gonna be good.”  
  
“I don’t think I’ve heard this one” Lyla blinked at him.  
  
“For good reason” Shin groaned.  
  
“So Garin was this old coot in the building. He smoked like the cheapest fucking cigarettes—like the ones they’ll basically just give you for free. And for some reason he was bald but had on a net—I think he used to work at one of the restaurants. He was batshit crazy” Joe replied, “The biggest thing he did was, on the roof, he had this cage that he would trap pigeons in. And the local legend was he would eat them.”  
  
The audience groaned in disgust while Shin simply shook his head. Joe, animated, smacked his hand into his fist, “So I was like, ‘Shin, we’re gonna go free Garin’s pigeons’. And punk Shin was like, ‘nooo, maybe those pigeons are his only friends’ or ‘maybe the pigeons need his help’. Stupid shit.”  
  
Shin couldn’t help laugh at that, recalling that he did say something along those lines. “Well…”  
  
“I was like, whatever, man, we’re just doing it for kicks anyway. So, we sneak out, it’s like, eleven o’clock at night, Garin goes to sleep at like…seven so we’re rock solid, he’s not coming. We go up to the roof…and I shit all of you NOT, the rumors of this building…paled to what was actually occurring on that roof. There were, NO LIE, no less than five hundred pigeons in that box.”  
  
“Oh my God” Aden groaned.  
  
“Now here’s the important part, ya’ll” Joe exclaimed, “I, the leader of these antics, was like, ‘oh, fuck no’ and was ready to bail. There was enough of them to peck us to DEATH. So I turned to Shin and I was like, man, abandon damn SHIP. And THIS punk—this guy, this ‘maybe the pigeons are his friends’, he was like, ‘oh no, we are bailing these pigeons’.”  
  
Komari giggled, “Yep, now that sounds like Yagami.”  
  
Shin smiled as Joe threw his hands up, “But at the TIME, that was NOT how Yagami worked. Dude was not about that life, man! So, I was like, ‘oh my God, what do you MEAN? They’re gonna kill us!’. And he was like, ‘no way, look at them all cramped up and trapped in that cage. They deserve to be free!’. And I was like, what do you mean, fucker?!”  
  
Sonja chuckled, “Oh my God, what happened?”  
  
“So, I convinced Shin they’d peck our faces off. But the super? He had this long graspy thing he used to get stuff from behind tight areas. Shin was like, let’s get that, we’ll take off the lock, use the graspy thing to get the hinge, and we bail.”  
  
“Wow…you were a damn tactician at five, bro” Komari gasped, pouring herself more of the drink she made from a pitcher.  
  
“Maybe” Shin snickered.  
  
Joe nodded, “I had nothing to say, I was so damn impressed with this idea. So, we get a hammer, manage to not smash our fingers and get the lock off, and then we stood in the direction of the doorway, flipped the latch…and PANDEMONIUM. The pigeons…blotted out the sky for a solid minute as they just BOLTED. Screeching, shitting, feathers flying—it was beautiful.”  
  
Lyla bit her lip as Shin grinned, “Yea, you’re a real poet.”  
  
“Now here’s where…I now understand what you’re saying about this whole desert thing. I couldn’t even grasp it at that young age, but Shin was always thinking like two steps ahead, man. He was like, we’ve done this step, there’s more—he was like, we gotta make sure…that Garin never tries to put pigeons in this cage again.”  
  
“Oh wow” Komari droned.  
  
“How’d you do that?” Sonja questioned, bewildered.  
  
Shin felt a little surprised because he did forget he…had calculated this whole thing out as a five-year-old. Having to reprocess, his brows furrowed, “…What was it? Jake the Snake?”  
  
“Jake the Snake” Joe smiled widely, tipping his head at Shin.  
  
“The wrestler??” Aden echoed.  
  
Nodding, Joe picked up the brown bottle of alcohol, pouring another glass, “Well, we din’t know about that at the time but yea, he got the name from American wrestling. Big deal here.”  
  
“He was one of those drug dealers we mentioned. His real name was Jaken. On the side, he…bred snakes” Shin rolled his eyes around.  
  
“And he HATED Garin” grinned Joe.  
  
Sonja chuckled, covering her face, “…What did you do?”  
  
“Well…let’s just say that when Garin went to collect a pigeon for breakfast, he did not get the member of the animal kingdom he was expecting.”  
  
“Oh my God” Komari cackled, “You know that’s some gangster shit, right, Blue Eyes?”  
  
“Maybe, but it did the trick. Not one pigeon was ever collected up there again” Shin winked.  
  
“And that—that was the difference between those other guys and my boy here, one of the reasons I kept in contact with him. Hell, I would trek like two hours over here after he moved when I had the time. Shin was going to get shit DONE. It wasn’t enough to just go at it one way, Shin was taking care of the whole shebang. That wasn’t a mindset you get outta Wasaba, man. Short, quick, easy and sloppy is the way. Not Shin. If he was gonna do it, he was gonna go every meter, yard, foot, centimeter—whatever. When I heard he joined the army, I thought, ‘y’know what, if Yagami did it, he did it for a reason’ and I felt better about going there too. My guy” Joe held up his glass.  
  
Shin knew the man was super drunk, as the Wasaba way was to never be this flattering, but Joe sounded really sincere. “I appreciate that Joe, really.”  
  
Komari nodded, sipping her drink, “I didn’t grow up with Yagami but after seeing the way he handled our first combat situation, I thought the same. Even if I questioned him, I knew he’s always thinking about the best way and the way to resolve a situation.”  
  
“OUR first combat situation” Shin huffed.  
  
“Bitch, you accept a compliment from him but not me? Sir, when I am complimenting you, I don’t need you leveling the playing field for US” she heckled.  
  
Oh. “You’re right, nee-san…thank you” he sighed.  
  
He snickered as he smacked his chest, telling him to ‘quit it’. Lyla frowned, “Shin’s younger than you, Komari-san?”  
  
“Yea, like two, three years” Komari nodded.  
  
“Wow…can you believe it’s almost been four years since basic, Shin?” Aden shook his head.  
  
Shin groaned, “Tell me about it, it…it really is flying.”  
  
Just…what to do now? He looked up, shocked, when there was a raucous sound at the door. Eh? Eyes narrowing, he stood and got ready. Bajiru was showing up pretty late…  
  
“Calm the fuck down, GENERAL, it’s just us.”  
  
As soon as Shin rounded the corner, he relaxed and stared incredulously as his brothers and Itoh Kasumi came in, almost walking sideways. Koji seemed the soberest but…that wasn’t saying much. “…Where the hell have you BEEN?”  
  
“Man, where HAVEN’T we been?” hiccupped Nelly, leaning against the wall, his eyes closed as if he were falling asleep.  
  
“We went to this rave club place, then this bar called Tijuana, karaoke bar, thuh mall, Starbucks” Koji slurred, counting off incongruently on his fingers.  
  
Shin gave him a look, “You drove back like this?”  
  
“Nahhhh, when the roads looked like I was spinning, figured I’d sit that DUI out. I left my car at Keiba’s, our last stop, and we gotta cab back.”

Good ol’ Koji. When he was irresponsible, he was still somehow very responsible. Kasumi…looked amused? And it scared the hell out of him. She said in amazement, “…I wasn’t aware you could drink that much and not be in a coma.”  
  
“Well, it’s…probably still not recommended.”  
  
“Did I hear my baby?”  
  
Glancing over his shoulder, he found Komari walking down the hallway to the foyer. Kasumi’s green eyes lit up. It was actually really cute. “Mari! Oh my God, I had an okay time?”  
  
“Question mark?”  
  
“Yea, we may have, uh, convinced her at her most panicked to take a few puffs of our rather potent weed so her calm may not be a hundred percent natural of herself” Koji explained slowly.  
  
Komari raised a brow, “…You got this mostly straight edge to smoke pot?”  
  
Kasumi hugged Komari’s shoulders, resting her head there, giggling, “I love you so much.”  
  
“Wow. You are drunk and high” Komari said airily, “I never thought I’d see the day. Are you hungry?”  
  
Shaking her head, Kasumi stammered, “K-Koji and Nelly fed me very well. And th-they even chased off a bastard th-that tried to hit on me before I-I even had tuh.”  
  
…He’d chase off someone trying to hit on her too. Pouting as Komari smirked, kissing Kasumi’s temple, “Usually you’d hate that, baby.”  
  
“Ye-s-s-s, but wuz very efficient and quick so I wuz impressed” Kasumi mumbled, apparently about to fall asleep, “Iz…iz there a bed somewhere? I…I juz need tuh rest my eyes for a sec…”  
  
Shin sighed, tilting his head, “ I guess we can go take a look at this pod house.”  
  
Komari nodded, thanking Koji as he grabbed their baggage from near the front door and handed it to her, “Thanks, guys. While she will probably deny it wholeheartedly tomorrow, she had a good time tonight.”  
  
“She was actually more fun than I imagined” Koji nodded.  
  
‘Fun’? Komari snickered, “Well, that is more news to me. Thank you so much.”  
  
“….You think she’d wake up ready to fight me if I carried her?” Shin snorted.  
  
“Probably” Komari laughed, suddenly picking Kasumi up pretty neatly, “I got it. You’re not the only one that can carry a lady around, my guy.”  
  
He chuckled, taking the bag and leading Komari out of the deck door. It…was a weird house. Actually just a solid square with no slopes. There were curtains but the windows comprised almost the entire front of the house. Confused, he opened the door and glanced inside. Flipping on the lights, he was startled to find a small kitchen and a little sofa with a small television in a shelf with some books. Woah?  
  
Wandering in, he was…shocked to find there were two very miniscule bedrooms. And it literally was just like a bed room. There were some built in shelves in the wall but otherwise, the full sized bed took up about 85 percent of the room. The bathroom was also similarly spaced but…well, wow. Komari looked amazed. “…I mean, wow, this is still pretty nice to throw up in a few hours.”  
  
“Yea…”  
  
Komari sat Kasumi on the bed and he exited so she could get the woman undressed, sitting at the counter which was apparently where they were supposed to eat. “Well, I’m…glad those two got her back in one piece. I mean—I didn’t DOUBT they would, I just…”  
  
“Oh, you’re upset she gave them the time of day and not you.”  
 _  
“YES.”  
  
_ With a laugh, Komari replied, “I mean, Shin, you’re just a do-gooder. While I got to the core of you and understand that’s one of your charms, to someone like Sumi, that just seems like you’re hiding something or trying to get something. Your brothers are out there and slightly deviant, she can see them for what they are.”  
  
“I mean, I wouldn’t say all that, both of them are good people” he countered.  
  
“Oh, of course they are” Komari amended, “Just a little less…knightly about it.”  
  
Oh yea, no, even when his brothers performed good acts they seemed almost criminal in nature. “Well…dunno if I can help that.”  
  
Reemerging, Komari smiled, “Nah, bro, don’t change who you are for Sumi. She’ll come around. She knows deep down in herself you’re a good person but she also knows our relationship and doesn’t like that.”  
  
Of course… Shin blinked, turning his head, “…Teramoto called me.”  
  
“Oh?” Komari frowned, taking the remaining stool beside him.  
  
He nodded, glancing at his nails, “…General Yoshifumi, Teramoto, and I had a phone conference. It’s not…well, it’s not the most usual thing. They said if I remain in the army, I still would be in active duty. If I’m deployed, I go there with my regular army rank that I’ve gained and perform my duties.”  
  
“Okay…”  
  
“…They want me to build a team.”  
  
“Um, too soon.”  
  
Shin raised a brow, “What?”  
  
“Build a team of _what_?” she demanded, “We just got home!”  
  
“…It’s like a swat team, I reckon. We’d handle special assignments, special missions, security details—pays a little more decently than what we’re already commissioned at too.”  
  
Komari looked at him drolly, “…We?”  
  
Smiling at her, he blinked coyly, “You said Hell, Yamada.”  
  
Groaning, burying her face in her hands, she laughed dryly, “…I did.”  
  
“I told them the only way I’m building this team is if you and I are of the same ranking as officials in this unit. You’re not my second, I’m not your second, we’re both in charge.”  
  
“Can’t have two generals, Shin.”  
  
“Not doing the same thing” he nodded, “You can be in charge of stealth, tech, and medical operations. I’ll be in charge of combat, tactical, and administrative operations.”  
  
Recoiling, Komari looked horrified. “…Shin, one leg does not make me stealthy, okay?”  
  
“I have a guy.”  
  
“Um, what?”  
  
He shrugged, “That aside, what do you think? In maybe not a hundred percent best circumstances but 93 percent, what would you say?”  
  
Covering her mouth with her fingertips, she raised a brow, “…We operate as a separate entity but still have military duties. And we’ll probably still need work outside of this. But…this is _our unit_?”  
  
“Just have to get you on board” Shin nodded.  
  
Komari sat back, dribbling her fingertips against the counter. Her dark brows lowered and she stared out of one of the few uncovered windows. “…You’ll excuse me but it just sounds too good to be true.”  
  
“Like the others said, Komari: we made history. Probably even a Guinness record. They’re going to get scrutiny if we’re just… ‘average’, not that there’s a problem with that. They have to elevate us because that’s how the appearance needs to be kept. They aren’t expecting us to use this, that we’ll just bask off the glory and bullshit. No, we…we can use this to our advantage to make a difference, Komari. We can get to where we both want to be.”  
  
With a soft smile, Komari’s dark eyes closed, “…You still get to play the hero to this woman in this scenario, Shin, it’s playing like the same ol’ cliché. If you weren’t here, I wouldn’t be a thought.”  
  
“And if you weren’t there, I’d be dead in the desert” Shin countered shortly, “I don’t know what the fuck they’re looking at nor do I care. I need you. We do this well together and maybe I’m getting some unfair bias but I’m not making moves if they’re not with you. None of us are winning if one of us is being forced to struggle harder, remember? Well, we’re both winning this one.”  
  
Tapping her thumbs against her chin, she nodded once. “All right.”  
  
“Piehl, Bjerke, and Akiyama are still on active duty. When they return, I want to offer them a position on the team” Shin said, folding his hands.  
  
“Nepotism, gotcha” she snickered.  
  
“Perhaps. But, they’re special at what they do.”  
  
Komari’s brows tweaked, nodding, “One guy with a subspecialty in diving and nautical navigation, one dude that basically can operate a fucking mecha, and a woman that can route that bastard in any conditions? It’d really be more stupid to _not_ offer them a position.”  
  
“Itoh, of course, can be on your stealth team.”  
  
Snorting, Komari whacked his arm, “Bro, what if I put Lyla on as your secretary, would you like that?”  
  
“A little too much, actually, I’d probably be trying to get laid between missions.”  
  
She laughed, hitting him again, “Baka. Maybe _I’d_ try to get laid between missions too, huh?”  
  
“Mm, I think Itoh would be all business before pleasure.”  
  
“True” Komari smiled, “Okay, Itoh, Piehl, Bjerke, Akiyama…who’s on our medical?”  
  
Crossing his legs, Shin muttered, “…I asked Teramoto what happened to the nurse that brought me to you after the desert. Apparently, she was ‘demoted’ and now just does basically laundry. She’s just a few hours from being a medical doctor and she can’t get that washing sheets.”  
  
“Don’t have to tell me twice. Hakuryu” Komari nodded.  
  
“Torataro as well. Joro, Saki.”  
  
Making a surprised face, Komari stood, “…Huh, this team is actually sounding kind of nice, Yagami, not gonna lie.”  
  
“We didn’t end up only being the right people, Mari…we ended up surrounded with the right people too” Shin murmured.  
  
“Damn. I’m excited” she grinned, cracking her knuckles. “…I guess we get to fuck ‘em up all the time now, huh? What do we call our group?”  
  
“Well, they are going to address us as Sogen Ops. We can probably put in for a name change later” Shin shrugged, opening the door.   
  
Standing outside for a minute, he stared up at the stars. It was…unbearably cold out but the stars were so clear, standing out just so radiantly in the dark blue night. Komari stood beside him, hugging her arms. “…I like Lyla. She’s very sweet for you.”  
  
“…I met her going through that thicket right there. I was trying to get back to Wasaba to see Joe” Shin smiled softly, gesturing with his head toward their ‘jungle’. “…I wish I could say I met her and never looked back but…it worked out, I suppose.”  
  
“It did” Komari said faintly, “…Is she going to be on board with your ambition, Shin? She’s…she’s outside of this. From the sounds of it, she didn’t have a stable father or home life. Maybe…maybe this route you want to take isn’t the best for that? You’re going to be away a lot.”  
  
Digesting that, Shin felt his stomach knot. “…I dunno. You’re right, it’s…it’s a lot to ask of a person and while I told her I wanted to rejoin, maybe…maybe she didn’t want it to be this serious. I…I guess Joe was wrong: I don’t always look at the big picture.”  
  
Komari patted his back, “…Kind of hard to when it comes to the person you love. All you know is you want them there with you.”  
  
…Right.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _“Yaya is furious.”  
  
It was December 26th. Yagami Shin had had…the single best Christmas he’d had since his childhood. His family was all around, his friends came every day until today and stayed over a couple nights when they asked permission at base, Komari and Kasumi were currently cozy in their abode—it felt comfortable and he loved that. Yes, he woke up a few nights, shaking, needing help sleeping, but…every other segment of his life felt immaculate.  
  
Jovial, today, he called Hamasaki Ayame finally after all this. He felt bad because he hadn’t reached out to her yet since his rise from the dead but he figured she’d understand. Figured.  
  
Furious. That was all he got out of the phone call: fury. She was furious that, after getting shot the first time due to Kitamura’s negligence, that they had him return to active duty. Okay, that was…fair. Then she was furious that he…decided to volunteer to go out into the desert after explaining that most of the people that stayed by the wreckage DIED and that the army was not looking for them. ‘It was a ridiculous move, Shin!’.  
  
Okay. It was probably the downers he was on but he remained calm despite everything in his mind saying he should be angry. So, he tried to tell her about his friend, Komari, and how she lost a leg. In not…so many words, she eluded to that little pin prick feeling he got in his gut when he saw Komari’s swollen ankles and her slightly lilted walk, that that was due to his choices. Okay.  
  
She was mad he pretended to be dead. She was mad that, when that task was over, he went back and helped some more. She was mad when he said he got promoted and was given a pretty sweet opportunity that many in his position wouldn’t see for decades if at all.   
  
She was up the wall when he said he married Lyla. “I TOLD YOU NOT TO.”  
  
Sitting in a diner at a booth across from his dad, Shin rubbed his temples as they threatened and pursued the option of ticking and thumping out of his head. What…what made someone hear a story that probably made the subject feel like they’re on a mountaintop want to snipe them down? It was like he did absolutely NOTHING right at any point in his life with her and he was…well, he was just flabbergasted. He…he was fallen down to the place he was when he first got home, actually, he…he wasn’t sure if he’d done one damn thing right ever either now.  
  
Because, like this same person explained to him, he had Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and any litany of things that had him walking a tightrope trying to keep it together, he actually started to cry on the call. He didn’t WANT to, it just kind of…it just kind of hit him hard and he literally saw himself falling into a chasm after being so…so high.  
  
Of course, because he guessed whether he had faith in divinity or not, he was covered, Komari had come in to ask them something and saw him sitting there, silently weeping while he was getting lambasted. He just got choked up when she marched over and snatched the phone away, unable to advise that it was ‘okay’ while Komari pressed the receiver to her ear, listening to the woman’s words. After about a minute of just nonstop vitriol, Komari’s face darkened, “…Who the fuck is this?”  
  
… “Bitch, I don’t know. I’m asking YOU who the fuck you are and who the fuck you are to be talking to him like this because I’m ready to find you and punch you in the throat.”  
  
Shin had tried to garner the strength to take the phone back but he…felt so much relief not having to hear it, he didn’t even care that Komari took over. The brunette kept flexing her fingers into a fist before smiling tightly, “…I’m not going to allow Shin to continue this conversation, Bitch-san. You have some fucking balls on you to sit here and talk to someone like this. Who hurt you?”  
  
Shit. “Fuck off. Good bye.”  
  
Komari pressed the button and snapped, “Who the hell was that?”  
  
“…The woman who raised me.”  
  
Luckily, his dad arrived and asked him to have that ‘chat’ now. Komari patted him on the back and told him to go on with his dad and she went upstairs. What? Too dejected to think much of it, he went with his dad and…here they were.  
  
Yagami Yamada sipped the black cup of coffee, looking at the sun set early at four in the evening in the adjoining window. “…It’s no excuse, son, but by Wasaba standards, you…have done a lot of unnecessary things. Your Yaya is a creature of her habitat and also saw her brother killed over unnecessary things. To her, you’re…following the same path.”  
  
…Okay. “Am I?”  
  
“Not even slightly” Yamada scoffed, “I’m not proud of what my friend was up to. I’m proud of my son.”  
  
Shin smirked, spinning his mug of the same beverage, “Well, that might be bias, dad.”  
  
“Perhaps. But you have a plan, son. And, while Wasaba ways say you take the route that keeps you alive, yours…is ambitious and isn’t just looking out for number one. Ayame…unfortunately, she kept the Wasaba mindset of look out for number one alone and forget everyone else. Self-preservation is vital, it’s important to be able to put yourself first in some circumstances—but the world can’t manage if everyone can only think of themselves alone.”  
  
… “…Um, she…told me what she did. About…how she came onto you.”  
  
The man briefly choked on his coffee, hacking before beating his chest. “S-She did?”  
  
“Yea.”  
  
“…Really??”  
  
Shin was about to confirm…however, from his father’s tone, he got the idea that perhaps Yaya didn’t just ‘crawl into his bed’. “Well, she…she said she crawled into your bed while you were asleep and offered to mother your children and be conflict-free or something.”  
  
Yamada looked a bit…perturbed, glancing up and around. Not able to help a snicker, Shin shook his head, “I’m married, dad, and I’ll be 22 in three months. If you wish to disclose something of an adult nature, I’m good for it now.”  
  
“I…I mean, that…is the gist of it” Yamada said slowly, wide-eyed.  
  
“As long as you say you didn’t have sex with her, I’m sure it’s fine, dad” Shin shrugged.  
  
The blond rubbed his forehead, “Not consensually, no.”  
  
WHAT? “She-she raped you?” he mouthed quietly.  
  
“I-I dunno, I wasn’t going to call it that back in the eighties” Yamada made a face, “But…I guess by some definition, that’s what it was? I definitely was a passive participant for a few minutes before disengaging.”  
  
UGH. Shin gripped his hair, sobbing, “…I’m cutting ties too then, that’s disgusting.”  
  
She wasn’t even apologetic! The last last conversation they had, she made it sound like his father was the wrong one! Yamada shrugged awkwardly, “I almost wish you wouldn’t. I’d have to explain a lot to your mom if neither of us associated with her and that’s…not a conversation I want to have with Dana.”  
  
“And we’re about to have a ‘what a husband should do’ conversation?” Shin said dryly.  
  
“Yea, well, are you going to tell Lyla you had partial sex with Komari?”  
  
Dead. Shin almost literally died, inhaling hard. His father just smirked at him while Shin prayed the ground opened up and killed both of them. “H-H-How do you--?!”  
  
“She is a peculiarly open young woman.”  
  
DAMN IT, KOMARI. Burying his head underneath his arms, he whined. This was the worst AFTER Christmas he’d ever had. “…Okay, point taken.”  
  
“Your mother and my…past sexual history aren’t in conflict, son, I don’t want to make it sound like that” Yamada said softly, “…Just you know what your mother was going through, what she had to deal with. It meant a great deal to her that Ayame was there taking care of you where she couldn’t. To hear…to hear that same person was trying to steal her husband AND child away? It…it just doesn’t sound like it’d be productive information for her.”  
  
… “I do understand that, dad” Shin admitted, “…But like, she assaulted you and that’s bad.”  
  
“I won’t excuse her, son, but I wouldn’t be surprised if that wasn’t…an acceptable practice in her life. Living in Wasaba, a lot of unacceptable things were taught. While I would have never done anything to anyone sleeping, I just was lucky I never had that introduced in my life.”  
  
Eek. “But…you still knew it was wrong.”  
  
“Some people have to be taught things are wrong, son.”  
  
…Okay. “That aside, I’m not going to give you so much a husband talk because…I think each of you will find your way in relationships in the way that best fits you and whomever you marry. You and Lyla have a rich history and, I believe, without Bajiru in the way, you’ll start to communicate even better. I think Lyla will come into her own and grow confident and I think you two will be very successful.”  
  
Oh. “T-Thank you, dad. I guess I had a good role model.”  
  
“I could be doing better” Yamada chuckled, “Like, I had literally no idea your mother stays up until four in the morning now working on dresses, good lord.”  
  
Shin snickered, “Can you do anything about it?”  
  
“Nope” Yamada smiled, “Your mama is her own force and I love her endlessly.”  
  
“…Mm.”  
  
Somehow, the…conversation made him feel a bit better. After they finished their coffee, his dad drove them back to the Yagami mansion. The man put the car in park and looked off before grumbling, “…I was working with the Hondo police force on a community medical plan. I’m actually in pretty good cahoots with the captain. If…if you still want to be a cop, I can see if he can work with your schedule.”  
  
“…I dunno, dad” Shin whispered, unbuckling his seatbelt, “The last thing in the universe I want is to hear gunshots and make the wrong move or harm innocent people. I-If I were to be a cop, I want to do it for the reason cops should be there: to protect.”  
  
“Believe me, you’re already starting better than most of them with that” Yamada said, surprisingly sarcastic, “I’m definitely and I mean DEFINITELY not going to press you on that, son. But if you want to, I…I think you’re perfect for it. We can get you help with the trauma and try to get you regulated on a drug program to keep your anxiety down until you don’t need it anymore. But…I believe you’ll function perfectly.”  
  
…That was a lot to digest. His dad literally was ready to fight him when he started all this and now he was slowly encouraging him. Swallowing, just emotional today, Shin finally smiled. “…I’ll discuss it with the missus.”  
  
“Ha, that is true” chuckled Yamada, patting his back, “I love you.”  
  
“Love you too, dad.”  
  
A cop. It came up before somewhere but it was question where he would have peace if he was a cop and then overseas half the time too. Maybe…he was pursuing too much there.  
  
When they entered the Yagami abode, they found Lillian and Dana sitting in the kitchen, chatting over what appeared to be wine. Yamada smiled, coming to kiss his wife’s temple, “Hello, dear.”  
  
“Hey, you. What were you two up?” Dana questioned, looking up.  
  
“Oh, just a father-son chat” Yamada assured, going to the kitchen to apparently make himself a glass.   
  
“Uh huh” she smirked, smiling as Shin kissed her cheek, “Hello, Sweetie Plum. You okay?”  
  
Because his mother could read them like a book, she probably could tell he was at least slightly crushed by Yaya’s rebuttal. “Eh, I’ve…been better, mama, but dad made me feel better.”  
  
“Oh no. Anything you want to talk about?”  
  
To her? Not even slightly. Smiling, he shook his head, “It’s…just a Wasaba thing, mama. It doesn’t make sense to me anymore either.”  
  
Dana made a face, grumbling, “Well, I…lived in Wasaba for a little bit. And I almost got shot there, that has to count for something.”  
  
What?! His dad sipped his wine, drawling, “Your incredible lack of self-preservation, maybe?”  
  
“Shaddup. I married you, didn’t I?”  
  
Yamada’s brows quirked, “That you did.”  
  
Yea, well, start with THAT story of how his mom almost got GUNNED DOWN in this courtship, holy shit. Lillian laughed suddenly, a bell-like quality. He wasn’t sure he’d ever heard her laugh like that. “You all are so comfortable with one another, it’s so foreign to me but I like it. I’m glad Lyla got to feel warmth somewhere.”  
  
Oh… Dana patted her hands, “You still have all the time in the world, Lillian. Don’t let Bajiru be the end.”  
  
“Oh Dana” Lillian scoffed, “I’ll be a forty year old divorcee and all I’ll have to offer is my estate. I’ll fall right back into the same situation I had with Bajiru.”  
  
“I know a guy” Yamada suddenly said.  
  
Lillian giggled, “Yes, I know him too. I am a hundred percent certain that, at some eventual time, his spouse will return to him.”  
  
With a gasp, Dana clapped her hands together, “You think so too?”  
  
What? His dad looked incredulous, “…Are we talking about the same guy? I can’t see that happening, ladies, that’s…not how Wasaba people do things. Once we’re gone, we’re gone.”  
  
“Oh, don’t be silly” Dana chastised, “And Lillian, you have much to offer but you’ll find it if you want to. And if you want to, especially! Why, you can go travel and see the world now!”  
  
“M-Maybe…”  
  
Shin was sure that sounded super intimidating to a woman sentenced to house arrest for twenty years. “Well, let’s get Bajiru out first then we can look at all the things on the horizon. Where’s Lyla, by the way? She was doing laundry when I left.”  
  
“Oh, she went out with Komari-san, Kasumi-san, Sonja-san, and Jill-chan.”  
  
…What now? Shin smiled…some. “Oh. That’s…that’s nice.”  
  
“Ayyy, there he is!!”  
  
Jumping, grazing his pocket, he leered as Joe, Aden, and his four brothers appeared out of the living room like the damn horsemen of the apocalypse. Nope, Shin didn’t trust this. Koji smacked his shoulder, all grins, “C’mon! It’s time to party! We’ll be back soon, mom, dad!”  
  
“I won’t hold my breath” Dana remarked dryly.  
  
“Where the hell is my wife?” he demanded flatly as Joe and Aden pushed him down the hallway.  
  
“With LADIES doing LADY THINGS” Nelly chanted, “We’re about to go out with the boys!”  
  
Yep. Worst…after Christmas ever. But, well…at least he was here.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
_“God…God, my head, oh my God…”  
  
Yagami Shin had had some hangovers, he couldn’t deny that. The New Year of the millennium definitely came to mind. However, he had never been at the point he woke up with tremors which was _no laughing matter_ , what the hell did those bastards have him do last night?

When he opened his gritty eyes, he relaxed because the tremors weren’t internal…just caused by the fact he was almost upside down in the SUV they were in that was driving, the reverberations making his arm shake. Oh, _okay_. The sun…was up which wasn’t great either. Glaring toward the clock on the digital radio, he groaned loudly. “What. The. _Fuck_?”  
  
It was _four in the morning_. FOUR. “You _idiots_ , I am _married now_ , this is not _married behavior_.”  
  
“Relax” droned Koji, horrifyingly driving, “I called the house and told them we’ll be home late. Lyla wasn’t even back when I called thirty minutes ago.”  
  
… _Pardon_? “WHERE IS MY _WIFE_?”  
  
“Shut the fuck up, bro, some of us are trying to sleep.”  
  
Shin glared daggers…before actually jolting to find Joe was also upside down, his legs slung over the back of the SUV, beside him. “Holy shit.”  
  
Wait, wait—they had the _babies_ with them! Looking around quickly, he found Shaun conked out, his mouth agape and his cheek pressed slam against the glass window. Tony was weirdly face forward, face down in the seat, snoring, and Aden was in the middle, his head slung back and potentially comatose. He couldn’t see Nelly but he assumed he was in the front, dead.  
  
Trying to have his mind process, he couldn’t help notice everyone was…kind of sparkly. “…Where is this _glitter_ from??”  
  
“Glitter” Joe mumbled.  
  
“What??”  
  
“Glitter, the stripper that gave you a lap dance. She had a theme” Koji said casually.  
  
He was killing everyone in this vehicle. “W-What would make you—what—what in—WHY WOULD YOU LET ME GET A LAP DANCE?”  
  
“God, what woke him up…?” Nelly mumbled.  
  
Koji snickered, “Shin, you got like two minutes of a lap dance and told her she was ‘sexy’ but you have a wife. We proceeded to spend the rest of the night taking shots, going to the club, we went to an oxygen bar, did some indoor skydiving—it was great.”  
  
Shin buried his face in his hands. “ _Two minutes_ is too long, Koji.”  
  
“Literally, you should be more mad we spent money on oxygen than that.”  
  
About to snipe that a lap dance wasn’t exactly _acceptable_ in a marriage typically, he did find himself recoiling at Koji’s remark. “….I mean, how much are we talking?”  
  
“Uh…like a thousand gold pieces?”  
  
“ _We paid a thousand gold pieces for something that’s free?!”  
  
_ God, he knew this was a mistake. His wife was going to divorce him. Miserably, he stared at the kids. They seemed more covered in glitter than anyone in this car. He shook his head. “Lemme guess: they got lap dances?”  
  
“Um…yea.”  
  
“You know…I was going to let you two plan my bachelor party when I had my actual wedding but now I can say you’ve failed that interview.”  
  
Nelly snickered and Koji chuckled as they pulled into the driveway, “Nii-san, by bachelor party standards, we _nailed_ this interview.”  
  
Assholes. Disgruntled by the fact they now had to get everyone inside to bed, he glowered as Joe swatted at him when he tried to grab his arm to wake him, “Oi, oi, yer not the only one with touching problems asleep, buddy.”  
  
…Shit. “…I’m so sorry, Joe.”  
  
“Mm, don’t sweat it” he muttered, rubbing his amber eyes.  
  
…How horrible. Joe whistled loudly suddenly which managed to alarm Aden to waking up. Oh God, not Aden too. The silver haired fellow’s hair was standing up on end, his eyes bloodshot. “Oh. Oh fuck, w-what happened?”  
  
He had a hand in his pocket…when he removed it, he had a red lacy thong. “Ah!! What happened?!”  
  
“Just one of those nights” Nelly droned, opening the door and tugging Tony up.   
  
Koji opened Shaun’s side and was able to neatly catch him from falling, the youngest groaning and mumbling, “I dunno if I wanna party no more…”  
  
“We’re home, sunshine” Koji said dryly, helping him stand.   
  
Shin pushed the seat up so he and Joe could…stagger out. In what…had to be the most insane experience he’d had since, well, surviving months in the desert, he was almost more incapable of walking now than when he was _shot in both legs_. He almost teetered over into the ground, the limbs giving and buckling like toothpicks under a bowling ball. “Oh no.”  
  
Now, Joe laughed, grabbing his arm and pulling him up. “That’s how you know you partied too hard, my guy.”  
  
 _Clearly_. Aden meandered around the backyard, wobbly, to the guest house where he and Sonja usually stayed in the second room. Joe entered with him and the four of them, quietly as possible which was like trying to silently herd elephants, went up the stairs. Joe bid them all good night as he went to the guest room. Shin groaned as he helped Koji get Shaun into bed, Nelly able to handle Tony on his own, the youngest out cold. “…He is _too young to be drinking,_ Koji.”  
  
“I agree, he’s not even good at it” Koji sulked, resting his hands on his hips.  
  
Somehow Shin couldn’t help smirk at his younger brother, being that his dismay was not that Shaun was underage but that he was a lightweight. “…Koji.”  
  
“Hmm?”  
  
“Thanks…I…I guess for always believing in me and Lyla. You might not have nailed the bachelor party but you…definitely nailed me marrying Lyla on the head.”  
  
It was Koji that said they’d have to save Lyla, no matter what it took. He was…adamant very young that Lyla would be his wife and it all came true. Stretching, Koji yawned and walked with him from the room. “Well, it’s hard to see how you look at someone from the inside, bro. Lyla has always been in your sight.”  
  
… “Yea. Yea, she has.”  
  
Now to _keep her there_ because he was out all night apparently at a strip club! Koji winked, the child of darkness heading for his wing. “I’m happy for you, bro. You got your happy going. Y’know, since we’re not at the end yet.”  
  
“Not at all” Shin murmured, feeling a pang. Jeez, Koji…  
  
… “Don’t give up on your ‘happy going’ yet either. She might just show up one day and be just perfect for you too.”  
  
Koji scoffed, waving his hand over his shoulder, “One step at a time there, Shin. The future looks bleak for that.”  
  
…Nah. Hopefully not. Not…after everything.  
  
Dragging himself up the next flight of steps, Shin stood outside of his bedroom, staring at the door. Oh man. Here goes. Pushing open the barrier, he was expecting Lyla to either be asleep or up waiting for him in a rage.   
  
Staring, he found his fairy princess on her knees on the edge of the bed like she was praying, face down. She was wearing…a very slinky pink spaghetti strap dress. Signaling to him something was very off, she wore her shoes into the house, a big no-no to her. One was still on her foot, the other was about an arm length away. Her pink hair was literally stacked and spiraled all over her head.  
  
That damn Komari. “…Lai?”  
  
She groaned, turning her face to look at him. She apparently had had mascara on that had…run down her face in tearstained shapes. He…was entirely at a loss. _What_? Lyla, despite this state, suddenly cracked up, “…And what did _you_ get into?”  
  
Him!? What about her?! He opened his mouth to question but glanced into the mirror he had on the bathroom door. His hair was standing vertical in parts, a feat he wasn’t sure he understood without some sort of…gelling material. It was completely covered in glitter as well and he had the word ‘azure’ written across his cheek in red lipstick. Weird splotches of colored powder in shades of pink and yellow were dashed across his white shirt. Huh.  
  
Shin bit his lip. While…he was certain he didn’t like whatever happened tonight, he had to admit being kind of amused they both ended up a hot mess. “…Uh, let’s…just not discuss what happened to either of us tonight—yesterday.”  
  
“Deal” she giggled some, coming to her feet, “Komari is _wild_.”  
  
“Yea, she’s female the twins” snorted Shin, taking off his shirt. “…I know we’re not asking questions but did your night have any intervention from penis?”  
  
“I wouldn’t say ‘intervention’…” Lyla droned, taking off her other shoe, “…Invasion?”  
  
“Oh my God.”  
  
“I started to cry because I was touched by something Komari said, not because I was gagging on penis.”  
  
“Jesus, Lai” Shin couldn’t help laugh, wandering over to her to stroke her hair down, “You’re still drunk, aren’t you?”  
  
She smiled up at him, holding his cheeks, “Yea-a-a-a.”  
  
Kissing her forehead, he chuckled, “Let’s take a nice warm shower and go to bed, okay?”  
  
“Mmkay…Shin-chan?”  
  
“Yes, beautiful?  
  
His…wife, she walked over to the night stand on what was now essentially her side of the bed and opened the wooden drawer. Withdrawing a box, she returned, her cheeks rosy. “Komari mentioned that…that you were too cute to let walk around without showing you’re my husband.”  
  
That Komari. “You can trust me to turn them down every time, Lai.”  
  
“I know. Just…last time, you gave me a ring, you told me how…how perfect everything felt between us. You said you hadn’t expected it but I’ve…I’ve loved you for as long as I can remember and I…I almost lost you and I…” she paused, taking a breath, “Even…even when I almost lost you though, you…you always came and found me. Despite… _everything_ , you never left me behind. I love you.”  
  
… “The pocket watch? I gave it to you because…you’re the only person I’ve ever loved and the only person I ever wanted to marry. I…I thought that wasn’t going to happen but I…I wanted you to have it. In my head, no one else was going to deserve it. But…I-I still picked out a ring for you. Please, tell me if you don’t like it” she whispered, shyly taking his hand.  
  
Shin silently watched as she slid a simple silver band with some light carved embellishments onto his finger. “…I love it.”  
  
“Really?”  
  
“Mm.”  
  
“I’m…I’m glad you’re home, Shin. I’m glad you made it back.”  
  
Shin stared at her before hugging her tightly, his eyes burning now. He…really questioned if he should accept being able to come back here and just be able to have all this. So…so many people had lost their lives. Kitamura, Mako…God. _God_ , he’d _taken_ so many lives. He might take _more_.  
  
Those that made it back, they…they were haunted by nightmares. Him, Komari, Aden, Joe, probably Sonja and Kasumi. Kasumi, like his brother, had lived with nightmares long before this. The…casualties of a war that wasn’t even close to over.  
  
This path he was taking where he was going to be constantly away, fighting the powers that be, it…it’d make him something of a nomad at times. Someone that didn’t stay in one place long…  
  
But…he had his roots, his…garden here and not only would he protect the cause to take down the Zechs, he would protect his family, his friends, _Lyla_ —his _purpose­—_ with his life. His home…this one he still felt in the pit of his soul he didn’t deserve. Not after all the things he’d done, things people that raised him rebuked him for. Did he…deserve to be here?  
  
“…Lai, can I call you ‘taiyo’?”  
  
“You are not calling me the sun, Yagami Shin.”  
  
With a laugh, he held her hand, leading her to the shower. “I’ll just think it then…Yagami Lyla.”  
  
…He’d try to every day of his life.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

 **End Notes:  
  
** Alive, again, is by Pearl Jam. After my heart attack, I randomly took one of those stupid quizzes ‘What’s your grunge theme song?’. While I was still feeling low, it made me chuckle when I got ‘Alive’. Yep, still alive, ya’ll.  
  
So more 90s-ness, Jake the Snake was a wrestler in our _insane_ American wrestling. His MO was he had a giant snake that he would put on his opponent after he had them pinned to freak them out. The 80-90s was weird, ya’ll.  
  
Garin is a _slight_ nod to ‘Galen’ from AWL. Just slight.  
  
So, Oxygen/O2 Bars were kind of popular in the 90-00s. I think they might still exist but I definitely don’t see them as much nowadays.  
  
Oh, the biggest storyline shakeup here to Legacy, the series as a whole, is that prior, Shin and Lyla weren’t married. In fact, in old Step Toward the Future, Shin asks Lyla to marry him at some point off screen there. But, as this progressed, I started to think about how the two were kind of always together in that story from what we _did_ see of Shin. And I started to think, hmm, maybe they should just have gotten married earlier. So, that’s a retcon.  
  
This is the final chapter of the story coming from Shin. I have two sides coming up next. Anyone that read, thank you!


	20. Side Story: Worth

  
**Side Story** : Worth  
  
This is a follow up from the end of Nomad. It also goes more into Lyla’s perspective during the spans of the story. Enjoy!  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _“You know he’s a half-breed, right?”  
  
Then Okamoto Lyla looked up from her book, startled. One of her classmates was looking at her pensively, her dark eyes narrowed as she opened her textbook. Class hadn’t started yet but Lyla figured she’d get some last-minute studying in. However… “…Who?”  
  
“That boy you hang around, the one that comes and walks you home sometimes” her nose wrinkled, “He’s not like YOU, a victim of the Miriel Experiment, his eyes are that color purposefully. It’s dreadful.”  
  
Only fourteen at the time, Lyla was at something of a loss. Any sort of toxic ism made literally no sense to her. Besides that, what was a fourteen-year-old doing with that sort of knowledge? It…it was taught. It was taught to Lyla too but she…didn’t accept poison.  
  
“I’ve known Yagami Shin for eight years and I know everything about him. He’s my best friend and he’s a better person than you’ll ever be.”  
  
Lyla couldn’t remember her name. Hana or something. She’d gawked, her face growing red, before reporting to a teacher that Lyla had ‘sassed her’. The teacher had been just short of laughing at the girl. Lyla’s reputation of being nonconfrontational preceded her. If the teacher had asked, however, Lyla would have admitted it happily.  
  
…If there was one thing in her life she’d be able to stand up for, it was Yagami Shin. Or…so she’d always hoped back then.  
  
_Lyla slowly opened her eyes, drearily staring around the room bathed in the milky light of the early dawn. Sitting up in bed, she sat there for a moment, trying to gain her wits, before slowly settling her feet on the carpeted floors. She…didn’t like carpet.  
  
Taking her robe from the post of the king-sized bed, she wandered out, immediately in the living room and the adjoining kitchen where Yagami Shin was standing in front of the coffee maker.  
  
She smiled, noticing the way his body was slouched, his arms crossed and his shoulders drooping. Cautiously going around the counter, she bit her lip to find Shin sleeping standing up. Poor thing.  
  
“Shin-chan?”  
  
He came to quickly. She wished he’d sleep like he used to. He…never looked rested anymore. Rapidly shaking his head, he rasped, “H-Hey, morning, baby. God, did I still wake you up? I tried to be really quiet…”  
  
“It doesn’t matter, I can feel when you’re not there” she explained, hugging his waist.  
  
Giving her a sweet smooch, Shin rested his forehead against hers, “Well, you might have to get acclimated to sleeping through that, love, because I am on the sucker shift until I either rise in the ranks or die from exhaustion.”  
  
“I don’t mind…” she pouted.  
  
“And I don’t mind seeing you before I go” he smiled, holding her, “Just, y’know, there’s talks of finally putting Sogen into play and I might not be there at all for a little while.”  
  
Her chest gripping, Lyla tried to just…play it cool. “…It’d probably be wasteful but I might just go back to mom’s home when that happens.”  
  
“It’s not wasteful at all. I would rather you not be alone.”  
  
He pulled away to pour himself a cup of black coffee while she went to the refrigerator. By all accounts, both of them had a family that had mansions where they could reside very comfortably without worry. Her father very much took the case of ownership of the property to court with no intention of backing down. For some scary amount of days, his lawyers seemed to be on the winning side with their information and claims. Lyla had been…terrified. By that point, she’d been married to Shin for two months and the idea of…all of that coming undone? She wasn’t sure she would have been able to live with that.  
  
Alas, it was a false alarm. The judge ruled in their favor, indicating that perhaps her step-grandfather did make an error but it was not cleared up by his notary at the time of signing. Yagami Shin owned the mansion of her mother’s family.  
  
It was _ludicrous_ but, while Shin owned the property, due to the will Bajiru had tried to put into place, he was unable to change the guidelines for something like thirty years. Shin was appalled, fully intending to put the land back in her mother’s name. _“…But it still works out. If and when we have kids, I’m definitely not picking their spouses but hopefully they don’t choose some moneymonger and we can just keep passing it down. That, or once the thirty years is up, I can finally get it back to Lillian-san.”  
  
_ Her mother moved back in, all the servants except her father’s faithful ‘manservant’ staying on with her. For reasons Lyla couldn’t understand, her mother still gave her father 1.5 million gold pieces. When Lyla asked why, the woman just smiled. _“For all his faults, he still gave me you.”  
  
_ So…that’s how much she was worth? _“Oh, silly…how do I pay him in priceless?”  
  
_ It…was so relieving. Lyla had cried so hard that day. She…she was free. She had never dreamed she’d be free. Shin…Shin had done so much for her.  
  
They both had just turned 22, however, when, despite the fact they had access to two large mansions, they decided maybe it was time to move out. Shin had joined the police force of Hondo. The station was located in Hatani, around thirty minutes from Subami. Once Shin got through the academy, he had to be up at four in the morning for his shift since he was the ‘new grunt’. It took its toll and he was exhausted after the ten hour shift then one hour commute. The icing on the cake had been when her mother barged in on one of their…intimate intermissions. Shin _pleaded_ they move out.  
  
They both hunted before finding an apartment about ten minutes from his job. It was a bit bigger than Shin’s apartment in Wasaba had been and it had a nice bathroom. But…carpet. She hated carpet. However, the price was reasonable and it made it so her hubby wasn’t commuting more than thirty minutes. She could live with carpet.  
  
Yawning into the back of his hand, Shin finished his cup of coffee before pointing. “Back to bed, ma’am. I want you to get some more rest before you head to work.”  
  
Yes…taking out the bento she made him the night before, she rested it in his bag, “Have a good day, Shin.”  
  
“You too, baby” he murmured, giving her another kiss.  
  
Watching him leave, she wandered back to bed, crawling back under the covers. She could get another hour or two. Smiling, she closed her eyes and listened to the light sounds of early morning outside. It…took some acclimating. They were, by all rights, suburban kids but…

It was worth it.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
Lyla hummed, arranging the little satchels of bath salts in the display before going to start to dry the petals out for their spa kit. Shin always used to say she was good at this sort of thing but she had only ever thought being a wife was in her future. She wouldn’t have minded that with Shin, honestly, but…well, she looked at his mom and she just felt it’d be a little sticky to him if she was sitting at home.  
  
No, that wasn’t the only reason else she’d have discussed it with him. She didn’t want to sit at home without him, for one thing, and she wanted to buy him things with her money while also providing for the house. She found this job at a little bath and spa shop about a ten minute walk from their apartment.

Even though she preferred to walk, Shin had helped her get her license and, using a chunk of the military bonus he had, purchased her a 2001 Volkswagen Beetle for her birthday. He had teased he wanted it in pink for her but that was a ‘specialty’ color. Lyla chose the Vortex Blue, thinking it was cute. Her brothers-in-law had seemed to say it wasn’t something for them to ride in when she asked them to which was oddly…sexist for them. Alas, once she managed to coax them into it, amusingly, she saw what they really meant: All of their heads hit the ceiling. Cutely, they all still chose to ride with her though.  
  
Thinking about plotting a visit to her now extended family, Lyla looked up with a smile when the bells over the door jangled, signaling someone was entering. “Hello! Welcome to Iris!”  
  
It was owned by a middle-aged man named Jonas, reminding her of the Weezer song if nothing else. He stated that a family tradition was to have every second daughter named Iris. He said he only had sons but thought it was such a weird habit that he named his shop that instead. He was very kind if not sort of a wimp. He eagerly allowed her to basically run the shop so he could stay in the back and just work on arrangements. Shin had told her dryly he needed to pay her more then. She did _decently_ but it could be better.  
  
Her eyes widened when in came her old classmate, the one that indicated her now husband was ‘dreadful’ for his lineage. Yes…Hanna. Well…Jonas may have to come out here for this.  
  
She had two other women with her, both dark haired and absently looking around. Lyla didn’t recognize them but that didn’t mean anything. High school felt like eons ago now after all she’d been through.  
  
Hanna finally locked eyes with her before her brows furrowed. Darn it. “…Oh, Okamoto-san?”  
  
“Hello, um, Kakazu-san.”  
  
“Suzuki now, actually” she smiled, readjusting her purse.   
  
“Oh, congratulations” Lyla smiled back, going behind the register.  
  
…Damn it, she didn’t correct her either! The…the one thing she still had a hang up on was she had managed to become a Yagami. While she was frustrated, Hanna peeked around, drawling, “So, you work here?”  
  
“Mm. I enjoy creating things like this so I figured it was a good fit.”  
  
Hanna blinked, “Well, hobbies are a thing, Okamoto-san! Working for it is so…plebeian!”  
  
Four years later, still a piece of work. Uncertain what to say to that, Hanna’s eyes suddenly glowed. “Oh, I heard about your friend and that military affair. Sounded like nasty business.”  
  
… “It was…”  
  
“Well, I suppose that’s what you get, meddling in other people’s affairs” she sighed.  
  
Times like these, she wished her husband _wasn’t_ a cop. She’d hate to have to be bailed out by him when he just started. Smiling tightly, she opened her mouth, “…Jonas-san!”  
  
Hanna looked baffled as Jonas shuffled out of the back room, looking confused, “Lyla-san?”  
  
“Mrs. Suzuki wanted some assistance.”  
  
“Eh? I didn--”  
  
“O-Oh, well, all right” Jonas stammered, coming out and wringing his hands.  
  
Ugh. Prepared to go back to _work,_ something unthinkable as a non-hobby, Hanna scoffed, “Really, Lyla, you’re still getting defensive over childish things! You can’t _possibly_ still be sentimental about him.”  
  
Lyla stared at her gravely, “…It’s still fresh to me because I never thought I’d deserve to have any claim to their family. You’ll think I was hiding it but it gives me great pride. I will also correct you and say I am _Yagami_ now. I am _quite_ sentimental about my husband.”  
  
Hanna recoiled in shock, her companions looking briefly confused before one of them brightened. “Oh! Is he related to Koji?”  
  
“Mm, that’s his younger brother.”  
  
“Oh, tell Koji that Marika says ‘hello’!”  
  
The other friend gasped, looking to apparently ‘Marika’, “Oh, the twins! I used to love their parties!”  
  
Lyla was sort of amused as Hanna’s face darkened considerably for the fact her party was quite infatuated with her ‘dreadful’ family. “…Well, congratulations to you. Still a shame, needing to work.”  
  
“My husband could take care of us entirely, Suzuki-san, but I do get a bit lonesome without him and I also want to spoil him.”  
  
Hanna probably opened her mouth to tell her that was stupid. Marika, however, giggled. “I know what you mean. My Reginald had a housekeeper that would bring him those puddings—the chocolate and vanilla one? Why, his mother banished them for being a lowly thing but he told me how much he loves them so I like to get those for him as a treat. It’s so sweet surprising him after a long day.”  
  
“Yes, my fiancée loves Chupa pops and Shonen Jump so I’ll go down to the convenience store weekly to get them for him” nodded the other.  
  
Hanna looked stunned like the idea of, oh, paying attention to the husband’s quirks and perhaps wanting to surprise them was unthinkable. “…Well, ladies, a man ought to be able to ‘spoil’ _himself_.”  
  
Marika pouted, “Well, of course Reggie can get his _own_ pudding but after a long day of work and dealing with all those dreadful people, I don’t see any harm in me getting him some to have when he gets home. He’s tired.”  
  
“Besides, he thinks of me when he sends me flowers and chocolates, I ought to think of him too” cited the other.  
  
Flustered, Hanna sniffed, “Well, I didn’t think to be surrounded by such…nontraditional types.”  
  
Of course. Nodding her head once, her eyes narrowed, Hanna forced a smile, “Well, it was nice seeing you, _Yagami-san_. Congratulations again on your nuptials.”  
  
“You as well” Lyla bowed.  
  
She stalked out of the store and Marika reminded her once again to say ‘hi’ to Koji, skipping out with the other one. Shin often told her when the universe just let the cards lay beautifully where they may it was the best feeling in the world. She agreed.  
  
Jonas looked a bit bewildered, “…Um, what was that?”  
  
“Rich people.”  
  
He laughed a bit, going back toward the work room, “Don’t you fall into that in some regard, Lyla-san?”  
  
Perhaps, but she never went around belittling people and their ‘friends’. Making a face, she sat back down and started her task finally. Funny though that they were all…married or about to be. Shin said it was actually kind of young for them to be married. While, yes, a lot of their generation got married either right out of high school or college, it…did feel like they were a bit early.  
  
She smiled, thinking about making Shin some skipjack teriyaki tonight for dinner. He would probably attempt to make it himself after he got up from his usual nap but…she wanted to ‘spoil him’.   
  
No, this was…this was perfect.

  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
She lost her husband.  
  
Lyla stuck her key into the doorknob of the Yagami mansion at around six, a bit confused. Shin usually got off of work at three and was home waiting for her when she arrived at four. Tonight? Not so much. She called him, there was no answer. At…at first, she was terrified. What…what if…  
  
Alas, at around 5:30, her mother-in-law, Yagami Dana, called. _“Hey, sweetie, I just got home. Your husband is currently dead asleep on the couch.”  
  
_ Before those last four words, Lyla almost had a heart attack. Entering the house, she wandered in and rounded to the living room. She bit her lip, finding Yagami Shin cheek down in the chaise part of the sofa, his jaw slack and drooling. He always used to say he got the best naps on this sofa. “Shin?”  
  
He didn’t rouse. “Shin?”  
  
“Mnuh…?”  
  
She never could ignore how he reached for his pocket when he was woken up by someone or some sound. At first she just thought it was something absent but then she came to realize he was reaching for a weapon. It…was a lot to digest sometimes. However, his blue eyes opened zonkily and he turned over on his back, staring at the ceiling before looking baffled. “…Huh?”  
  
“I thought you were missing, baka” Lyla smirked, walking over to him, “I guess that doesn’t need to be my first assumption, you might have just run back to your mama.”  
  
Shin groaned, sitting up and rubbing his face, “My bad, baby…Tony wanted me to check a rubbing sound in his car and I was helping Jill change the oil in hers. I came in and took a quick shower and I guess…that was a wrap.”  
  
Smiling, she kissed his jaw, “It’s fine. I’m just a worrywart.”  
  
Resting his head on her shoulder, she felt him seem to fall back to sleep. Her poor baby. She managed to ease him back without stirring him, covering him with a blanket. He never slept well so she preferred this. Going back to the kitchen where Dana was now, sipping wine, Lyla winked, “I’ll leave him in your care, he’s sleeping like a baby.”  
  
“Oh, he’ll be up in no time, I’m sure” Dana smiled wistfully, the rim of the wine glass pressed to her lips, “My sweet baby…”  
  
Mm… “I’ll check on my mama and head on home. Tell him no rush if he wants to sleep over, I’ll be fine.”  
  
Dana snickered, squeezing her shoulder, “He would never leave you all night purposefully, sweetie.”  
  
…Right. Kissing her mother in law’s cheek and heading next door, she hugged herself as she knocked. It…was funny how this didn’t feel like home. Her husband’s home felt like it, their apartment was starting to feel like it but this place…  
  
Marianne, the maid that had been there for ages, answered and her eyes brightened, “Lady Okamoto!”  
  
“Hi, Marianne” Lyla greeted, hugging her, “I was over at the house and decided I’d come and check on mama. How is she?”  
  
“As well as can be expected. She’s been reading quite a bit lately.”  
  
…Oh. Nothing was wrong with reading whatsoever, just…she didn’t get the idea that was necessarily by her mother’s direct choosing but what she’d become acclimated to. Following Marianne to the living room, indeed, her mother was curled up with a book and a cup of tea. The woman looked up and smiled. “Hello, dear!”  
  
“Hi, mama…”  
  
Her mother set the book down, marking the page with a strip of paper, as Lyla sat beside her. “How are you, darling? Are you and Shin okay? Do you need money?”  
  
“Mama” snickered Lyla, “We are _fine_. Shin got a…very decent bonus from the military. He’s working and I’m working because I guess that’s what society accepts.”  
  
Lillian looked thoughtful, musing, “Oh. Well…I would hate to take paying work from someone that needs it.”  
  
“I’m not saying _you_ , mama…”  
  
“No, but, I think it’d be something different. Maybe I can volunteer at the library?”  
  
“That’d be fantastic, mom!” Lyla gasped, grasping her hands, “You’ve read so much, you would be a great fit!”  
  
With a nod, the woman gave her fingers a squeeze. “I’ll look into it…now you, when am I getting my grandchildren?”  
  
“Oh my God, mom” Lyla gawked.  
  
“What! Why, I was younger than you when I had you” Lillian huffed.  
  
Leering, Lyla shook her head, “…Look, we aren’t _aiming_ but I don’t-I don’t think we’ll be against it if it happens. But don’t be looking for them in the near future.”  
  
“Oh, pooh.”  
  
With a sigh, Lyla rubbed the bridge of her nose. “…I’m tired from work, mama, so I’m going to head home. You should stop by some time.”  
  
“O-Oh, maybe…”  
  
Lyla smiled, kissing her mother’s cheek, “The world is your oyster now without him, mama. Don’t be afraid to go out and live it.”  
  
Lillian sighed, standing to walk her to the door. “…I’ll try, dear. It’s scary to go alone though.”  
  
Grimacing, Lyla nodded, “…I know. I understand. I’ll…I’ll help when I can.”  
  
“Oh, silly, don’t worry about that. You have your own life ahead of you to live. Don’t worry about your old mama.”  
  
“You are not old” Lyla sulked, “…I’ll come by again soon, mama, and I’ll take you to dinner or lunch. We’ll go somewhere fun.”  
  
“If you insist. You go work on my grandbabies, you two seem to enjoy that.”  
  
“ _Mom_.”  
  
God…grandchildren. _Children_. Lyla had enjoyed watching Jill, Tony, and Shaun grow up. They were darling children and it was a marvel to see them become adults before her very eyes. Next year they’d be graduating and out in the world. It was daunting but she was excited for them. Could…could she do that as a mother?  
  
Making the drive back to their apartment, Lyla pondered if she wanted to cook dinner for herself. She still wanted to make Shin’s lunch for tomorrow. He said he often had no time to stop on patrol, especially when in South Wasaba.  
  
Lyla was a bit naïve to what would make them designate the territory into cardinal directions. It seemed a bit superfluous. However, when Shin rather fearfully told his father where his ‘beat’ was, Yagami Yamada had just blanched. She asked Dana and the woman had groaned. _“…It’s literally the worst area of Wasaba. North, East, West are the less…active areas in that order. South is…not a great place.”  
  
_ Appalled, Lyla pushed that Shin request a different route but he assured he’d be fine. Really? Meanwhile, besides worry to death, all she could do was make him lunch… sighing, she went to prepare the skipjack teriyaki. Growing up with Shin, she always imagined he’d take a…calm job just because he was such a calm person. However, as they got older, she noticed his eyes when he featured injustice. He wanted to correct it. When he told her he wanted to be a doctor, she was delighted because that…wasn’t going to be dangerous in general. Then, he turned around and joined the army.  
  
…It…was a bit of a concern when it came to children.  
  
Lyla pulled on her apron and turned on the radio, humming, as she took the skipjack tuna from the refrigerator and started to debone it. Preparing to dice it, she turned the radio from a commercial…  
  
 _If you’re horny, let’s do it. Ride it, my pony.  
  
_ Flustering, Lyla turned the dial again quickly. _–Smell sex and candy here, mm hmm. Who’s that lounging in my chair, hmm?  
  
_ With a snicker, she just turned it to the CD option and let the Linkin Park CD Shin had purchased play. It was a wee bit heavier than what she was used to but it wasn’t going to remind her she hadn’t had a...joining moment with Shin in about a week and a half now.  
  
She’d always remember him just ambling into her yard, looking terrified. He used to have a slightly messier bowl cut back then, his dark bangs falling over his crystal blue eyes. She’d spotted all of the children once when the Yagami family were going on a walk together and thought it was ‘strange’ to have so many kids, given she was and still was an only child. In her mind, she _had_ wanted to approach them though, they seemed so…giddy. Shin just happened to find her.

For the first time outside of school, she’d gotten to play with someone. She’d…asked if he’d come back, thinking he’d say ‘no’. She’d asked her mother and father if she could go over to someone’s house to play, the latter always forced a ‘no’. She asked if she could have someone over to their house then, again, ‘no’. Only when the parent themselves asked was it allowed but her? ‘No’. That’s what she was used to. Yagami Shin always came back.

As they grew, she realized Shin was just about the prettiest boy she’d met. The whole family was, of course, but Shin had those shocking eyes. Over time, she came to realize it most likely wasn’t the color but just the way he’d look at her. He gave her undivided attention and listened to her…  
  
Maybe around, perhaps, thirteen, she noticed…something. When Shin and his brother shot basketball or played a game of American football or actual football, though rare, they’d strip off their shirts, getting hot and sweaty in the summer humidity. At thirteen, he wasn’t particularly muscular, no, but the formation of them were there. She wasn’t exactly sure how to describe it back then…but she liked them very much. And he only got more muscular as he got older, his face getting more defined as well…  
  
It might have said something about her father, but she was trying to find an empty VHS to record a series she liked one day. Just so happened the first one she chose, despite having _no_ writing on it, had some very…explicit material on it between a man and woman. She turned it off immediately and fled the room after…well, okay, at least three minutes of watching in horror. It was three minutes of…penetration and suddenly anatomy made a lot more sense to her. Just so happened when her father’s family insisted they come to the villa her father sponsored with his wife’s family’s money, she also caught her cousin jerking off. She’d come to the conclusion, along with the suggestions of her patriarch, that it was for…male enjoyment.  
  
She never thought to question that. _Everything_ seemed to be for male enjoyment so why not? Just…she hadn’t been able to get over the way Shin would make her feel at times. The woman in the VHS didn’t seem to be exactly enjoying it but she didn’t seem to be against it either. Eventually her father also advised her on ‘correct’ behavior. Submit oneself and when her husband advised he wanted to sleep with her, she needed to do so without question. Until there was a husband though, she needed to ‘keep her legs closed’ because she had parts now that men desired and she had no business concerning herself with.

Thus, when Shin asked her to sleep over once, she was…a bit appalled. Of course, it was Shin and he was just being kind but she thought immediately of the couple in bed and her father’s mantras. They…had parts now that didn’t make that appropriate. Shin had teased but she’d been so serious. As usual, because he listened to her, he picked that up and had seemed a bit…off put when he walked her back. She assured him that she trusted him and she did. He’d not do anything untoward to her, she knew that. The frank truth was that she would have definitely wanted to have done something ‘untoward’ with him.  
  
For a while, she shunned herself because Shin didn’t seem…that way at all. Like, he never eluded to it or made jokes like his brothers did. He had for a time there solidified himself as a chaste type in her mind. Of course, then came the day before his eighteenth birthday. She’d been doing it since they were _seven_ , Shin usually sleeping in a bit later than she was allowed to. She pounced on him so innocently…  
  
It grazed her inner thigh and it scared her. She had literally no idea what that could be…at first. He woke up, alarmed, and…confirmed her disbelief. She…naturally hadn’t seen many but that seemed rather…large. And definitely aroused. She was horrified.  
  
He explained it away. ‘Morning wood’. Yes, that’s what her cousin had said as well. Shin had meandered away to take a shower and she noticed under his pillow there was a magazine. His chastity image quickly fleeting from her mind, she grabbed it to look it over. Porn. Her best friend looked at porn. However, unlike the pornography her dad had secretly recorded on blank VHS tapes, Shin’s was generally _only_ women. She’d been perplexed there was…more than penetration.  
  
Shin returned, aghast she was looking, and took it away. Well, she’d been more curious then. She asked him some general questions about what she’d seen and he awkwardly…explained it. When he explained the woman touching down south, Lyla was baffled. But…why? That wouldn’t make a man feel good, right? To her further confusion, Shin had offered that she…make herself feel good like her cousin was doing at the villa. Her _male_ cousin and she was… _puzzled_. She didn’t have a penis, _how_? Not to mention _why_? It was for _male enjoyment_.  
  
 _“Lyla, it’s your body. And I would hate for you to get involved with someone and think that you’re not supposed to get something out of sex!”  
  
_ Lyla shook her head currently, rolling riceballs in her hand. Had she had the energy or the confidence, she probably would have asked him for it right then. She got scared, really. When she figured out he wasn’t this greatly virgin human being, she became…enticed a bit before telling herself that was _highly_ inappropriate. He…wasn’t going to be her husband and she’d had instructions to wait.  
  
Putting the bento away, Lyla covered dinner and went to get dressed for bed. When he told her he loved her, she…couldn’t quite hold back anymore. The words had never been given to her before, not even by her mother, probably because she’d never heard them from anyone herself. It was an innocent affection but she kissed him on the lips. In her mind, that…was probably going to be the extent of their affectionate actions.  
  
She was very wrong.  
  
Pursing her lips, she looked back and concluded she was probably going to be alone for a while. Going to her drawer, she removed the box holding her…backup.   
  
Shin picked toilsome jobs, the type that kept him in the best shape because he needed to be. The way his muscles stacked on his frame was the most attractive thing…Koji talked him into it on the twin’s birthday, requesting they all get tattoos together. She always thought they were funny looking but the ivy ringlet around his bicep with a rose did not hinder his appearance slightly and actually made him look ever more beguiling.   
  
Lyla rasped as she ran her fingers down her panties, shutting her eyes. Shin even smelled yummy, something she attributed to perhaps almost sandalwood? Something close, something earthly and intoxicating. Dragging down her panties, she was dismayed. Her excitement seemed…poignant, perhaps overkill. Shin remarked they almost never needed lube and she wondered if that was normal.  
  
“Shin…” she whispered, pushing her finger inside to find…

When Shin touched her, he was able to go deep and find the little pap, this small area that made her climax every time. He’d tease it, his fingertips dancing over the flesh. Anxious, she grabbed her vibrator, the pink plastic pulsing to life as she ran the length across her clit. Clenching her breast, squeezing her nipple as she pushed back her bra, she shivered, “A-Ah, Shin…”  
  
He was so thick and long. Someone once advised at school that those types often didn’t focus on skill because they thought the…attributes were enough alone. Her dear husband was not in that group…  
  
Turning over on her stomach, she whined, pressing her face into his side of the bed, reaching back to pump the pale comparison inside of her sex, flicking her thumb across her clit. “Mm, Shin…”  
  
“…Y’know, I never can believe I’ve gotten this lucky.”  
  
Somehow she didn’t jump much, turning on her back to stare at her husband. He was leaning against the door jamb, his fingers gripping the side and his other hand in his pocket as he smiled. “I heard you told my mama to keep me. Am I interrupting, hmm?”  
  
“Baka” she sulked, sitting up on her haunches, “You were sleeping and I wanted you to continue to rest.”  
  
“Mm hmm…now my sleep schedules gonna be all screwed up. You’re going to take responsibility and put me to sleep, right?” Shin teased, walking over.  
  
Biting her lip, she nodded and grabbed the ends of his shirt, pulling it over his head as he raised his arms. Shin leaned in and kissed her hard, his tongue coiling around hers. Mm. Hugging his neck, she murmured, “I-I want to touch you, Shin. You’ve touched me the whole month.”  
  
While they hadn’t… ‘joined’ in a week, Shin always made sure to get her off somehow. In comparison, she did feel like the nympho in their relationship. She tried to hold back since he rarely took the lead but he assured he was quite okay with her letting him know when she wanted it. Which…was literally almost every day. But she wanted to…spoil her hubby a bit.  
  
Shin shook his head, “I’m okay, baby. You always make me feel good…”

“Please?” she pouted.  
  
He groaned and slid to lie on his back in bed. Unbuttoning his pants, Lyla gave him a sulky moue, “You like doing it to me, why can’t I like doing it to you?”  
  
“It’s weird.”  
  
With a snort, she sat on his crotch, taking her sundress off and unclipping her bra. Leaning over and playfully jiggling her breasts near his face, she joked, “It’s _weird_ you like to too.”  
  
Grinning, Shin pinched her nipple, remarking, “Maybe a _little_ but yours are all nice and soft, they’re fun to play with. It’s just like a pebble on a rock with mine.”  
  
Lyla laughed, kissing him, “ _Maybe,_ but you like it.”  
  
He sighed as she kissed down his neck, across his throat and down the dip between his pecs. They’d been drunk one night about a month ago and she had teasingly sucked _his_ nipple and was surprised by how apparently sensitive they were? He’d _also_ been caught off guard and seemed against it but only because it was ‘weird’ that he liked it. Boys.  
  
“Mm…” he mumbled, pressing the back of his hand to his mouth as she wrapped her tongue around the nub.  
  
She reached down, uncovering and wrapping her hand around his cock, gently stroking as she continued her administrations. Shin trembled, his manhood getting harder as she suckled. “Lai…”  
  
Well, he liked other places licked too. He shut his eyes, his cheeks a bit flushed as she wrapped her mouth around him. Gazing up at him to gauge his reactions, she blinked when his eyes finally opened and he gazed down at her. “…Stop.”  
  
Lyla pulled away, prepared to pout…but squealed when he pushed her onto her back and pushed inside. Oh, okay.  
  
“Mm, mm, Shin, harder” she begged, gripping his shoulders as he thrusted.  
  
With a chuckle, he adjusted his hips and slid in further, gripping the bends of her legs. Mmm. Running her fingers through his hair, she kissed him. He had been coerced to cut his hair, unfortunately, but he only took off about six centimeters so it shopped about mid-neck. Just enough for her to enjoy…  
  
“Fuck, Lai…” he groaned into her neck, his steady grind intensifying.  
  
She didn’t want it to stop. When she heard some women speaking in the store a few days back, they lamented their boyfriend being unable to make them orgasm. Lyla felt, once again, she must have been broken because she had never had that problem with Shin. Choking, she squeezed his shoulders tighter, shuddering as her sex contracted.   
  
…It wasn’t exactly listening to her mother? “S-Shin, ca-can you come inside me?”   
  
While he didn’t remark, he did comply, his seed shooting inside of her. He pulled out, wiping his forehead, and turned over on his back beside her while they caught their breath. Shin ran both of his hands down his face, gazing at the ceiling, “…Lai, I might have a brief stint in Iraq coming up in a few months. My general said it’ll probably just be six months but that’s…that’s still a fair amount of time so, if we’re talking kids, we need to talk them _before_ I shoot my jizz inside of you, baby.”  
  
Lyla pursed her lips, smoothing her hair back, “…Do you have concerns having children with me?”  
  
“Of course not. I have more concerns about you having children with _me_.”  
  
“…I think about your job risk sometimes. But you promised you’d always come back” Lyla glowered at him.  
  
Shin sat up with a sigh, covering himself, “…I really love and respect my dad to the fullest, Lyla. Like, entirely, and I’m…I’m so proud of him. Just, I…I have a lot of memories of him not being able to be there. Enough that…the idea I might not be here with you or our kids, it kind of bothers me.”  
  
Eyes widening, she sat up as well. “…You never told me that.”  
  
“Mm.”  
  
“I understand” she murmured, holding his hand, “…But when do you foresee yourself _not_ being taken away by duty? Both of your jobs are subject to you not being able to make choices about where you get to be.”  
  
“Ha…that’s true” he mumbled.  
  
Rubbing his chin, Shin’s brows quirked, “…Let’s get at least a year under our belt, baby. I mean, time isn’t some scheduled thing but at least by that point I’ll be home and should be home for a while.”  
  
Lyla pouted, “ _Should_.”  
  
“…Yea” he smiled grimly, “I’m sorry. Maybe I’m not a great husband for this.”  
  
She grunted, crawling into his lap, “You’re the best husband already. This part may be tricky but it says nothing about who you are. You’re trying to make the world a better place and if I had to take care of myself and the kids while you’re away, I’m going to do it. I…I want to be able to be the wife that can do that.”  
  
“I know you’d be fantastic, Lyla. Guess…I really should have looked to pick a slower career path.”  
  
He embraced her, kissing her temple, “…I don’t want to rush it regardless. I like us right now. And, no offense, a newborn while I have to get up at four in the morning? Daddy might not make it.”  
  
Giggling, she nipped his cheek, “Yea, you’d probably be running off to your parent’s house a lot more for naps.”  
  
Snickering, he rolled his eyes around, “I would _not_ …I’d probably be thinking about it _a lot_ but I wouldn’t do it.”  
  
Shin gave her another kiss before standing to stretch, heading for the shower. Lyla followed him, entering to rinse off. While in the small stall, she noticed Shin give her a brief look of confusion. Hmm? “What’s wrong, Shin-chan?”  
  
“…Oh, uh…nothing” he smiled, stepping out.  
  
What now? He’d dried himself off and put on his leisure clothes by the time she finished. Sulking, she went into the living area where he was making a plate. “What, Shin?”  
  
“Really, it’s…none of my business…maybe?”  
  
What? “Shin, just say it.”  
  
He awkwardly shrugged, going for the fridge to get out a beer, nudging it shut with his shoulder and grunting a bit. “…I mean, I guess you do most of the shopping but…I guess I just…never noticed you needing…lady things.”  
  
Lady things? She raised a brow, grabbing her plate and taking a seat across from him. “…Lady things?”  
  
“Well…remember how I called you and was having a freakout because of Jill and her…starting her ladyhood? Like…I don’t see miscellaneous products around here? Or you…needing them? I dunno, I just hope you’re not playing covert ops to keep me from being dismayed or something. Sounds like something your dad would do.”  
  
…Oh. Flustering, Lyla now was the one shrugging her shoulders. “…When we broke up, I just…kind of stopped having them frequently.”  
  
“…Wha?”  
  
Lyla pursed her lips, eating a bit of rice, “Do we have to discuss this right now?”  
  
“…How you’re _not having a biological function_?” Shin questioned incredulously, setting his chopsticks down, “How long?”  
  
“I mean, they can tend to be sporadic, Shin. Sometimes they would come on time but sometimes I might miss four months out of the year.”  
  
Her husband looked _horrified_. “ _Lyla,_ that’s not _normal_.”  
  
Ugh. “Shin…”  
  
“Lyla, we’re talking about having _kids_ and you’re telling me you don’t regularly ovulate so we can have them!” he sulked, “Not to mention there could be something _wrong_. Have you been to the doctor?”  
  
“…No. I have not been to a gynecologist yet” she muttered.

“… _Ever_?”  
  
Rolling her eyes, Lyla sighed. One aggravating thing about Yagami Shin was the fact he _was_ a doctor’s son. “Lai, what the hell? Please, make an appointment and get yourself checked out.”  
  
“You want some stranger digging down there?” she leered.

“I want you here with me forever” he said seriously.  
  
…Baka. Blushing, she nibbled her tuna before nodding, “…Okay. I’ll…I’ll make an appointment. I’m sure one of my friends can refer me.”  
  
Shin nodded, “I know it’s awkward…I can go with you, if you want me to.”  
  
Haha, no. “No, I will face _that_ journey alone, Yagami Shin” she stuck out her tongue, “But thank you.”  
  
He gripped her hand, bringing her knuckles to his lips, “…I love you, Lyla. You…mean the world to me so, please, I…I just want you to be okay.”  
  
Making a face and swatting at him, she reassured that he was being a worrywart like she’d been earlier. In her mind, her husband was possibly in a gang shootout and injured or worse. Apparently in his, the fact she might miss menstruating for a few months might mean she was dying.  
  
No, not…not after getting here. Not…after finally getting exactly what she’d always dreamed about. She…couldn’t lose this.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

She spoke to her roommate from college, Reiko, and asked whom she saw for her physicals. Reiko highly promoted her doctor, Dr. Shinpu Lara. She said she was a thorough young woman and a fellow ‘pinky’. Lyla seemed to be meeting a few of those lately, musing that she should host dinner for Sonja and the rest of ‘Sogen Ops’. According to Shin, her ‘pinky’ of the group just had break up number five with Aden…  
  
Lyla didn’t quite understand that. Sonja clearly loved Aden and vice versa so why did they break up so much? Shin shrugged, _“They do well as friends. If I had to say, when they start over their relationship, it might be fueled more by familiarity and lust than a deep romantic bond.”  
  
_ …Well… Shin had smirked when she was worried about that sentiment. “ _We have familiarity and we can’t stay out of each other’s pants, sure, but we are definitely a bit more than that, Lyla. I would ask Aden if he ever looked at Sonja and envisioned a future with her. I’m almost certain he’d say no. I think about what our future could look like. What…our garden would like.”  
  
_ Sitting on the examination table, Lyla absently looked around. Their garden…she would like a house. The apartment was nice but she would like a literal garden too, somewhere where she could go and grow lilies and lilacs and maybe some roses. Maybe somewhere where their children could run around…  
  
There was a dainty knock at the door and Lyla swallowed, nervous, as a young woman walked in, all smiles. “Good Afternoon, Yagami-san!”  
  
“A-Ah, good afternoon, Shinpu-sensei.”  
  
Dr. Shinpu sat down on a stool, flipping through the information Lyla filled out. “Oh dear, you haven’t had a period in two months?”  
  
“A-Ah, yes, I-I generally don’t have monthly periods” Lyla stammered.  
  
“Since you started menstruating?”  
  
“They…they were much more scheduled when I was younger but when I…I turned nineteen they just sort of started showing up less.”  
  
On her life, she’d never forget. When she finally got the nerve to ask Shin for something she was only supposed to receive from her husband, he was naturally reluctant. She’d only asked that he show her how to please herself since he said it was possible. He…tried to simply teach her. Perhaps the ‘male enjoyment’ part started to cloud his senses, he started to get excited too. If she wanted to be truthful, she had been delighted he found her arousing and…the opportunity to share that with him was too ideal to pass up.

He seemed surprised when she was aware how to pleasure him. The lesson would be described as ‘insane’ to anyone with an ounce of modesty or at least…perhaps _thought_ but the male ‘speaker’ came into the _Catholic_ school, proceeded to draw an erect phallus on the board, and explained _exactly_ how to properly pleasure their husband. She still hadn’t described that to Shin, he’d probably never let her do it to him again when he’d liked it then and now…  
  
 _He_ was anxious. She was…okay. Yes, it was supposed to be with her spouse but she truly thought no one would show her how it was done _correctly_. She didn’t think after that she’d enjoy her sex life and, well, she enjoyed sex with Shin immensely. And he definitely started to enjoy it too.  
  
“Let me get some bloodwork, Yagami-san, then we’ll take a look” Lara nodded.

Great. Lyla held her arm out as the woman started to prick her. It was that time she really started missing periods which was why she thought she was pregnant with Shin’s baby. She threw up too. She realized it was from anxiety because Yagami Shin kept requesting that she be his girlfriend. She wanted to be his. Not his possession but _anything_ to him. But she…knew.   
  
Her beloved was prepared. In his mind, he was ready for that baby. He was going to marry her right then and there and made sure they received his benefits in case of the worst. He was going to get them a place to live and he was…he was going to be there. Never in her life would she have gotten that devotion from someone her father chose, even if they were a nice person. Parsley, Louis, they’d…they’d never have just been prepared to do what they had to because it was her. It made her nauseous right now when she remembered the look on his face when she advised she couldn’t keep it if there were a baby.  
  
…That was such a lie though. No way on Earth she would have ever been able to get rid of his baby. If she had walked into that pharmacy, bought the test, taken it, and it said ‘positive’, she’d have that man’s toddler right now. No, she walked in, got the test, took it, and it came up as negative. Negative, Lyla. You already knew you couldn’t have what you wanted. When Shin dropped her off at school, silent the whole ride back, she received a call from her father, commanding, saying to dress ‘modestly’, she was meeting a potential husband tomorrow. Yes, negative.  
  
“Do you check your breasts for lumps, Yagami-san?” asked Lara as she examined them.  
  
“…Um, not precisely but I’m…sure my husband would have noticed and said something?”  
  
While Lyla expected the doctor to scold her, the woman looked amused. “Well, I’m sure your husband is a good backup but make sure you know how to do it too.”  
  
The woman showed her how to test for mounds that shouldn’t be there, clearing her as ‘free of anything outright noticeable’. Okay. Lara explained the…next part and Lyla just wanted to crawl into a hole. Ugh, _why_ , Shin?  
  
Because he heard you were ignoring a part of your health, dummy. Like, after catching her essentially on a coordinated date after rejecting his requests for a relationship _and_ saying she wouldn’t have his child, he still questioned if she should be moving around after her ‘abortion’. He’d told her he wouldn’t even ask what the results of the test were but how? He was hurt, all he’d known was she’d come out in tears. She should be _relieved_ there was no baby. No. Shin offered her everything she could possibly want of a relationship when there was a baby on the line. And, were she actually pregnant, there was no way her father was going to risk standing. He’d have finagled it somehow to his favor and she would have been able to marry Shin. It…would have been a nightmare for her mother but it was her dream then.

Shin offered it without the baby after she explained the circumstances but…no. Without the baby, her father would…would never allow it. Shin said he wouldn’t have wanted a baby to have to live through such complicated stipulations. He probably didn’t see it the same way but…he got his mother out of a circumstance. From her understanding, Yagami Dana was engaged to wed young and the only reason she had everything she wanted was because Shin tipped the scales. Maybe…it wasn’t all perfect in his life, of course, but…he was still the person that he was and she loved him.  
  
She’d gone shopping with Shin before the twin’s eighteenth birthday. He was leaving soon and she’d been pulled aside by her father that morning in the presence of her freshly bruised mother that she needed to cease all contact with that ‘hafu bastard’ immediately or her circumstances would only worsen. She begged for _one_ more day, begged he leave her mother out of it. Bajiru spat to ‘end it now’ and left to probably seek his preferred mistress. He probably had other children, even.  
  
 _Behind her eyes there's curtains but they've been closed to hide the flames. Remains… She knows their future's burning but she can smile just the same. Same… And though her mood is fine today, there's a fear they'll soon be parting ways…  
  
_ Pearl Jam hit her like a train when they were heading home, the lyrics so true she couldn’t help but dissolve into tears. Yagami Shin would have come over and beaten her father black and blue if she told him. Probably _would_ have dangled him out of a window. But, then, none of it would have helped. They were still too young for loopholes and the man had the cards stacked against Lyla. They…had to part ways.  
  
“…Everything _looks_ good, Yagami-san.”  
  
Lyla opened her eyes, having tried to focus on anything besides the doctor swabbing in places only her husband and she were privy to prior. Lara had been…feeling around and her brows appeared pensive. “…I apologize, Yagami-san, I know this is your first visit and these are always uncomfortable but something feels a bit odd. I’d like to request a transvaginal ultrasound. I have to place an apparatus down there.”  
  
Oh. “Um…well, if you suspect something, please.”  
  
Lara nodded, going off to retrieve this technology. What? What felt odd? Lyla…was down there quite often, she didn’t feel anything weird? Lyla was a bit disgruntled as Lara returned and got her prepped before…well, again, doing something only she’d done to herself and her husband had done to her. Ooh, Shin.  
  
“…Oh.”  
  
…Oh? Lyla looked to the doctor, taking a breath, “…Oh?”

“It…may be difficult for you to see, Yagami-san but I’ll show you” Lara murmured.   
  
Show…show her what? Her heart racing, she followed Lara’s free hand to the rolling monitor she brought. It reminded her of an ultrasound for a baby but it was just…a blur of shapes. However, Lara ran her finger around a circular shape of fuzzy white. “So that’s your ovaries, Yagami-san.”  
  
“O-Oh.”  
  
Lara clicked something to zoom in, drawing around…smaller circles within the ovary. “Yagami-san, these black spaces are cysts.”  
  
Panic. God, panic. “I-Is that bad?”  
  
“It’s actually very common for young women to have polycystic ovaries, Yagami-san, and usually it’s quite harmless” Lara assured, removing the ultrasound and helping Lyla sit up. “…However, in those cases, they’re not as problematic because they aren’t presenting any abnormalities.”  
  
Oh no. Lyla stared at her. No. “…I…Okay.”  
  
“It’s a little unusual…do you have acne?” Lara asked, retaking her seat and opening her notes.  
  
“B-Break outs here and there but not really.”  
  
Lara’s brows dropped, frowning, “…Do you have unusual hair growth? You know, on your face or is it thick on your body? Hair _loss_? Your hair looks quite healthy though.”  
  
Hair?? “No, I…I mean, I shave every other week but I roomed with another young woman and see other women, I don’t think I’d say it’s comparatively any thicker than theirs and not on my face…”  
  
Tapping the pen to her forehead, Lara looked…torn. “…The fact that you’re not menstruating regularly is concerning, Yagami-san, and you do have enlarged ovaries and the cysts present. I don’t want to confirmatively say it’s Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome. It’s just so strange to see it without the other symptoms.”  
  
What was _that_? “W-What’s that?” Lyla whimpered.  
  
Lara closed her notebook, her amber eyes calm, “It’s nothing to fret over, I promise you that, Yagami-san. We’ll look at your bloodwork but your hormones may be imbalanced. Androgen is considered a ‘male’ hormone but women have it as well. With PCOS, you may have an overabundance which would cause the hair growth…however, due to your irregular periods, you may be lacking progesterone. Progesterone…well, it plays an important role in menstruation along with estrogen. When you’re lacking in it, it causes the period issues and…well, because there’s not enough progesterone to create the environment for a healthy egg, you may struggle to conceive.”  
  
Everything just went black.  
  
What? What…why? “…You…you mean I won’t…be able to have my husband’s children?” she barely got out.  
  
“I’m going to prescribe you a few options, Yagami-san, and we’ll try to increase your progesterone level along with seeing if these cysts are having any part in that” Lara assured, “The most important thing is to raise those levels. Even if you get pregnant, you have to keep them high enough that you don’t run the risk of miscarriage.”  
  
Covering her mouth, Lyla almost broke down into tears. No, no. “Don’t give up on me yet, Yagami-san” Lara said seriously, “I see you want to have children so I am going to try every possible option until we have one. I truly believe we can get this right.”  
  
…Really? “…Okay.”  
  
Dr. Shinpu prescribed some supplements, insisting that Lyla remain optimistic while she just wandered out of the wing in a fog. Oh. She…she wouldn’t…be able to have Shin’s children at all. Dragging herself toward the elevator, she pressed the button for the ground floor, feeling faint. Negative. Again.  
  
Entering when the door opened, she curled into the corner. There was one other person there but Lyla hadn’t…thought to pay them any mind, she had too much on her own.  
  
“…You’re Lyla, correct?”  
  
Eh? Startled out of her misery, she quickly looked up. She wasn’t very tall but taller than she was with shoulder length black hair, wearing a white coat over a pink blouse with a purple skirt. Eh? “U-Um…yes.”  
  
Who was this? Was she a colleague of Shinpu-san? The woman gazed at her with dark eyes emptily. Why’d…it feel so personal then?   
  
“…You’re married to someone I consider my son but we’ve never met. I’m Hamasaki Ayame.”  
  
… _Yaya_. Standing up straight, Lyla stared at her in shock. She…had never met the woman, actually. She never came to the mansion and generally Shin would go see her alone. Last…she heard, the two weren’t on good terms because…Shin married her. Bowing all the same, Lyla rambled, “O-Oh. Um, i-it’s nice to meet you. Shin has spoken of you for many years.”  
  
“Yes, I’ve heard quite a bit about you as well.”  
  
Oh. Uncertain what else to say, Ayame instead turned her face back toward the front of the elevator, the long ride down eons longer than it ought to have been. “…Shin’s well?”  
  
“O-Oh, yes, he’s-he’s working. He’s…a police officer now, in South Wasaba.”  
  
“So I’ve heard” she scoffed, “…I can’t believe Yamada would even fathom being okay with that. It’s a slap in the face.”  
  
Well… “…He believes in his son.”  
  
“And since when did he start believing in _everyone else_?”  
  
Lyla gaped a bit, at a loss, as Ayame glared, “I don’t know much about you, _Yagami-san_. Only that Shin, like his father, got involved with someone else that seemingly has ‘rich people problems’ that have nothing to do with him. I told him to be wary but now he’s your husband. I don’t understand the match nor do I want to. Just don’t mess with my boy and wreck his life. He’ll stick with you when he shouldn’t and sacrifice himself to the very end foolishly. It’s not worth it.”  
  
All Lyla could do was stare as the woman got off the elevator, disappearing on one of the hospital floors as the doors slowly closed behind her. Wreck…his life? Not…worth it because…  
  
…  
  
 _Standing like a statue, a chin of stone, a heart_ _of clay._ _And though he's too big a man to say, there's a fear they'll soon be parting ways_

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
“Um, Lyla…you going somewhere?”  
  
She had tried. She ran into the apartment they chose together to start the first independent leg of their marriage and packed everything recklessly. Or tried to. By the time she pulled out the sundress he bought her for Christmas, she was in shambles and instead just collapsed on their bed, sobbing in agony. She didn’t…she didn’t _want to_ leave. But she also didn’t want to _wreck his life_. She _wanted to have his children.  
  
_ Somehow, she must’ve fallen asleep and given her husband a chance to come home to view her attempted flight. Shin looked more baffled than anything, standing in the doorway with his hands in the pockets of his uniform slacks. He looked exhausted and she’d covered the bed in clothes and junk! She was making it hard for him already. Sitting up, still in tears, she got out, “W-We have to divorce.”  
  
On Koji and Nerimaru’s eighteenth birthday, at the party, Shin had pulled her aside and gave her a promise ring. Despite all her dismissals, her seeming ambivalence on wanting to be with him, he still asked to solidify a place in her life. There was something about…him not wanting her to forget him. How? How even?  
  
They went to his room, had sex, and she was probably crying the exact same way as now when she left that ring, that promise, on his pillow. Yes. Yes, she wanted to promise and have a future with him. She wanted to be with him forever. He had made his feelings so abundantly clear and available and she’d had to say ‘no’. No, no. Another _no_. She left because, in her ridiculous head, that was going to be enough for Shin to feel like leaving her behind. After offering her the world and her seeming dismissal, he would hate her.  
  
No, Yagami Shin did what he’d done for her since they were children: he came to find her.  
  
Bajiru, that man that bore her, called her lifelong best friend a quarterbreed. A _quarterbreed_. He belittled Shin’s wonderful mother and father and the entire family. He made it seem like…like Shin wasn’t even worthy of her presence and it wasn’t true. It wasn’t true. He’d threatened his wife to make sure Lyla stayed quiet while he just demeaned and derided the love of her life. She…got to see his hatred up close and personal then.  
  
He left. And…he really, really left. Yagami Shin made _no_ attempts to come see her after that. None. Even after he came back after his first tour, she caught sight of him once leaving in his car while she was being driven home from school. Those…were the worst days of her life and she spent most of them wishing she’d never been born. Or, at least, born a son. What Lyla thought was the final proof that Shin meant to have nothing to do with her was, when he left again for his year-long stint, in the airport, she’d…she’d come to see him off. He saw her…and he just turned away.  
  
Shin sent everything she’d ever given him back over to her house. Knick knacks, CDs, mementos, the charms…what wrenched her of everything was the watch. The watch was the truest gift she’d given him. He had her picture inside of it so he…he had probably been carrying it, even. She managed to get Koji’s attention one day before Shin left. He had been a bit uncertain and suspicious but she pleaded that he give Shin the watch back, at least. Koji told her to write something and Lyla managed some ridiculous message. _I know you hate me. But please, keep this. And be safe._ Shin’s…pseudo mother was right: all she’d been was problems that didn’t relate to Shin’s life at all.  
  
Saying ‘we have to divorce’ after all that? It should have enraged this man. Yagami Shin, three years later, _snorted_ and walked into their adjoining bathroom. “Let me take a shower.”  
  
She was _serious_!! Frustrated, she moved everything off of the bed regardless to give him some place to rest. She’d…go to her mother’s and just…settle into solitary like the woman had been forced to do. Negatives were…all they were allowed.  
  
Wandering out after a while with a towel around his naked shoulders, wearing a loose pair of navy flannel pajamas, he blinked languidly at her, “So why are you trying to divorce me, ladybug?”  
  
“I’m not _kidding_ , Shin” she glowered, hugging her knees.  
  
“You don’t love me anymore?”  
  
 _Ugh_. She pouted sulkily at him. He knew _damn well_ she would never be able to say that. He smiled some, scrunching his hair, “Tell me what’s the matter.”  
  
“…I went to the doctor today” she whispered.  
  
Oh, _now_ he was serious. His blue eyes widened and he quickly dropped the towel, coming over to her, “What? What’s the matter? What happened?”  
  
Swiping at her eyes, she trembled and he seethed, embracing her in his arms, “Damn it, I-I knew I should have pushed to go with you. What is it? What do we need to do?”  
  
‘We’… “S-She said that…that I have cysts in my ovaries. She said it’s ‘normal’ if it asymptomatic b-but because I have infrequent periods that there’s-there’s a chance I’m low in progesterone a-and, as a result, I might not be able to conceive.”  
  
Shin looked startled as she wept, “A-And that’s why you need to let me go. It’s one thing after another with me. You deserve someone without all these-these stupid issues.”  
  
“Lyla, last night I got up after having a flashback where I cut someone’s throat and couldn’t sleep and went to watch television on the couch” Shin said bluntly.  
  
…Oh. Wincing, she pressed her chin to her knees, whispering, “R-Right, I…I shouldn’t…shouldn’t be complaining. My issues are small in comparison.”  
  
“That’s not what I’m saying at all” Shin groaned, exasperated, stroking her hair, “No. That’s not what I mean. I mean to say that…that nothing you throw at me going forward will make me leave you, Lyla. I have problems and you’re…you’re not one of them and you never will be.”  
  
…She felt angry. For some reason, she felt angry. Pulling away, she gritted her teeth, “Stop lying. I _might not be able to have your children_.”  
  
Shin scratched the back of his neck, looking a little…strange. _“What_? You don’t _want_ children? With as many people as there are in your family?”  
  
“With as ‘many people as there are in my family’, I am _bound_ to have a couple nieces and nephews, Lyla. I would love to have children with you, Lai, don’t think I’m saying that. I’m just…I just almost lost you before and us maybe not being parents one day isn’t a dealbreaker for me. If I was sterile, would…would it be a dealbreaker for you?”  
  
“You’re _not_.”  
  
“As far as you _know_ ” he scoffed, “I’m on medication, Lyla, some side effects are I’m not quite as virile as I can be. If the meds I need to cope took my ability to get you pregnant away, would you just…leave?”  
  
Lyla swallowed, staring into his crystal eyes. Baka. “…No, Yagami Shin, I would not.”  
  
Kissing her tenderly, he curled on his side, pulling her to lie with him. “Your doctor gave you replacement hormones though, right? We can always get a second opinion.”  
  
“…Yes, but _Shin_ …Shin, I want you to be a father” she whispered.  
  
“And there’s options for that, Lyla” he insisted, wrapping her hair around his fingers, “Adoption, the fertilization services, a surrogate. And if none of those sound appealing to you, let’s get a puppy.”  
  
Lyla sulked, “…We’d age slower than a puppy, I’d be devastated.”  
  
“Understandable.”  
  
She hugged his waist, her eyes closing some. “…I don’t know if I believe you, Shin. I don’t know if I believe you’re okay with me being…being _barren_.”  
  
Shin yawned into the back of his hand, resting his head near hers, “If I understand your father, he placed a high value on what it was you could do as a woman, what you were ‘supposed’ to do as a woman. If all that he plotted befell you, and this came up when he was trying to marry you off? He’d belittle you, make you feel worthless, for something that’s not in your control physically. I told you early, Mrs. Yagami, that I don’t have criteria for you. I want you to be healthy, happy, and here with me until the end. That’s it.”  
  
…Okay. “…Can…can you at least not give up on it either? Like…I appreciate you…you not getting upset or mad but can…can you try to be a bit gung-ho in us trying to reverse it?”  
  
“Of course” he assured, kissing her forehead, “I…I don’t want it to sound like _that_ either, Lai. I am a hundred percent going to be with you on resolving this. I just…I just don’t want it to kill you, me, or _us_ if we hit a wall.”  
  
… ‘We’. “…I ran into Yaya.”  
  
Her husband was falling asleep but his blue eyes opened again with this, his brows furrowing. “…Wha’?”  
  
“Your Yaya. She…recognized me in the elevator after I got my diagnosis.”  
  
Turning onto his back, Shin rubbed his face and dragged his fingers to drag his eyes. “…Do I…want to know what she said to you?”  
  
“Do you?”  
  
“… _Ugh_. Yes. What did she say to you?”  
  
… “She was very nice” Lyla smiled, sitting up, “You take a nap, I’ll clean up my mess.”  
  
“Lyla” he droned, “Yaya managed to make me _cry_ last time I talked to her, I greatly doubt she was ‘very nice’ to you.”  
  
Picking up her racks of clothes, she started to hang them back in the closet. It was…funny, really. Communication had always been her family’s nonpoint, they…they didn’t have the skill because they weren’t allowed to communicate, only to be commanded. She was okay with it as a ignorant child but the second she became aware her words had severe consequences, it fell to the way side. But…with Shin, it was always strong. It was always her that brought that weak link because she wasn’t used to it. The fact was, though, he…he always made her feel better. If she’d called him right after that appointment, she probably would have felt better.   
  
At Christmas, Akiyama Joe, Shin’s childhood friend from Wasaba, said the most impressive attribute of Shin’s was he always had a pragmatic head and planned two steps ahead. It made a person feel more…confident in even dire circumstances. Komari, Shin’s other best friend, said it was true given it’s what saved them. Now, he had calmed her down and Lyla had to put away all her possessions. Yea, Shin was her first call now.  
  
“ _Ly-laaaa.”  
  
_ She groaned, dropping her head back, “…She said she had heard all about me. She asked how you were doing, I told her you were working as an officer in South Wasaba, she said she’d heard, and can’t believe your dad backed it and it was a slap in the face.”  
  
“Uh huh…” Shin droned dryly, lying on his side and propped up on his elbow.  
  
“I said that Yamada believes in his son, she said something along the lines of ‘when did he start believing in everyone else’.”  
  
Shin rolled his eyes, lying down on his back again. “So, just talking shit about my dad again, huh? Figures. She didn’t say _anything_ about you though?”  
  


She hesitated. It was a social queue that clued to Shin she was trying to fabricate something and it was too late. He looked at her evenly and she mumbled, “She said…I don’t know much about you—me. She said you were like your dad and got involved with someone with ‘rich people problems’ that don’t have anything to do with you. She said she told you to be wary but you married me anyway. She doesn’t understand how we got together, why, and she doesn’t care how or why we got together. She said, verbatim ‘Just don’t mess with my boy and wreck his life’. She said you will stick with me when you shouldn’t and sacrifice yourself and, basically, I’m not worth it.”  
  
“And I don’t have to tell you that’s all bull, I hope?”  
  
“…Sometimes.”  
  
He waved her over and she wandered closer, sitting on the bed. Her best friend snuggled her to his body and kissed her sweetly. He was so sappy, she loved it. “I know, Shin. You’ve always been good to me.”  
  
“…It’s so hard, Lyla” he whispered, “Granted, I’ve…I’ve been back with my mother far longer, my…my first five years of life, that woman was with me _every single day_. She is…like my mother too and she…she’s acting like she’d rather be my enemy right now.”  
  
Lyla swallowed that, stroking his hair back, “…She’s concerned about you, like a parent would be, Shin. Just your mama and papa have always been ultimately supportive. She’s not there to see you all the time to know where your state of mind is.”

“I know. I just…need her to trust me. And not judge my _wife_ and especially not right after she got some pretty heavy news. You were in a damn hospital, she didn’t know why you were there” he snarled.  
  
Smoothing his brow, she kissed him sweetly, “Take a nap while I clean the rest of this up and I’ll start dinner.”  
  
“Let’s go out to dinner…I saw this venue for our wedding I wanted you to see when I was riding with my partner” he mumbled.  
  
… “…Sounds wonderful, Shin.”  
  
She sat up, staring out into the Summer sunlight and folded her hands. When she was just turning sixteen, her father offered her first potential spouse. His name was Parsley and she dreaded with her whole heart the aspect. She’d just given Shin the watch because she…she had very little in the way of expectations.  
  
When she met Parsley, he was kindhearted and not rude and she was…wondering what the deal was. What was the plot? Why would…her father choose someone so sweet in demeanor or was it a guise? As she aged, she realized that Parsley would probably gladly leave the house to her father without pushback and he had his own trust fund so he wouldn’t even be seeking the estate. Okamoto Bajiru was looking for pushovers.  
  
But, she’d been thrilled. Maybe it’d be okay. That’s all she was looking for then: okay. Parsley was _okay_ and she was ‘okay’ with that. She remembered telling Shin all about Parsley, eager to get him excited about this average partner. He smiled and listened like he always did. She did recall, however, the brief look of ‘oh no’ on his face when she requested that Shin meet him. He didn’t turn her down but she could tell he hadn’t actually _wanted_ to…why though?  
  
Parsley had picked her up, taking her to the French restaurant her father liked to make deals at because it seemed sophisticated. The food wasn’t that great and the staff effected supposed French ‘snootiness’ because they might have seen it that way on television. Lyla informed the hostess that they would have a third person joining them, his name was Yagami Shin, and he would ask for their party. The woman nodded and Lyla had been waiting in excitement. She…she had wanted Shin and Parsley to get along because this…this was the okay option. It was the best she was going to have.  
  
Maybe fifteen minutes later, the hostess approached the table, her face a bit cool. She questioned if a ‘foreigner’ was going to be joining them. A foreigner? Parsley had been confused and Lyla had questioned what she meant. _“You said ‘Yagami Shin’ but he doesn’t look like anyone with that name. He has bizarre eyes.”  
  
_ Just like Hanna. Lyla did recall in the back of her mind that Parsley was sitting right there so she should be on her meekest and softest behavior. Without really the filter she generally had, she countered, _“He looks the way he was born to look and that’s not any of your business. You were told I was looking for ‘Yagami Shin’, not to try to gatekeep my guest’s natural appearance. Bring him back immediately.”  
  
_ God. God, she was being mean to the workers and she _hated that with a passion_ but she’d literally advised ‘Yagami Shin’ and she tries to police the person saying their name was ‘Yagami Shin’. Parsley had seemed surprised and amused by her unusual outburst, for whatever reason. The hostess had blanched, nodding, and running off quickly. Shin had appeared not a minute later, looking calm because he…he didn’t take things like that badly most of the time the way he should. People…questioned _him_ but she was only questioned of her appearance by her father who balked that he had to ‘find someone that will take you for how ugly you are’.  
  
Shin was always mannerable, speaking with Parsley while she still was irritated over his mistreatment. That…that was the first straw. Then, Shin announced that he wasn’t certain the path to being a doctor was for him. She…she was of course concerned because with her best friend, the sky was the limit if that was off the table. When she tried to insist maybe he just…hadn’t seen the right things, Parsley rebutted, pretty ironically ‘ _you know pretty quickly what’s not right for you_ ’. That…was straw number two.  
  
…Parsley was ‘okay’ for her. But that was it. ‘Okay’. He didn’t ignite her passions and she had a passing attraction to him. It was more like seeing a moderately attractive actor and thinking they were cute. It…wasn’t his fault, no, but…if she were perfectly honest, when she got home and received that letter from him indicating his deep apologies and true intentions, she was only upset that ‘okay’ was out of the window, leaving room for ‘terrible’. When Shin came to found her as usual, he pretty much…confirmed Parsley’s words: ‘okay’ wasn’t going to be close to right for her.  
  
Because she’d been unable to defend Shin that one time, it….ended everything. What was ‘right for her’. She just…basked in the fact that he was okay. The hatred, it bothered her to her core, yes, but…even if he was right for her, back then, she just didn’t think she’d have ‘right’.   
  
There would never be a word available for the feeling. One of her classmates had been reading the paper before they started some inane lesson on doing dishes. Lyla had just been looking at the outside page when the headline caught her attention. ‘Local Soldiers Missing in Action’. It didn’t hit her. She read the smaller print. When Yagami Shin’s name appeared in the list of those missing, it felt like she got smashed apart.  
  
She had left. She got up and ran out of the room. Buying her own paper, she felt herself descending into…madness, perhaps. It in fact had a military picture of him, stoic. She kept reading it over and over again: _Yagami Shin (21) of Subami was declared missing in action by the Armed Forces after a routine supply mission did not arrive at Idra Base. At this time, crash debris have not been located and is suspected to have gone down into the Mediterranean Sea.  
  
_ Lyla took the bus back to Subami, almost running to the Yagami mansion. Nelly, Koji, and Jill were sitting in the living room in varying degrees of misery and she pleaded for information. Nelly told her that…they’d called and said they’d been looking for the plane for five days but couldn’t find it. They…they had Shin now listed as ‘dead’. Dead. Deceased. Gone. Minused out of life. _Negative_.  
  
Even now, she found herself getting choked up. She could have comfortably died for at least a few weeks after that. The last time she saw the love of her life, he looked at her like…like she had hurt him, like he stopped caring because it seemed like she had stopped caring. He died without knowing he meant the absolute world to her and she only could _dream_ of everything he’d given and offered to be hers, a _positive_ to her life of denials. He died thinking she…she thought _any_ of those things her father said.  
  
Livid, she ran to her mansion. It was too late. It was just _too damn late_ but she screamed. _“He’s GONE. He-he’s GONE and you TOOK HIM FROM ME!! He’s DEAD and he thought I’m the kind of monster that you are!! He thought I HATED HIM because that’s all you have to give: HATE. You took EVERYTHING from me!!”  
  
_ Bajiru had threatened to smack her if she didn’t ‘be quiet’. Lyla spat, _“DO IT. I don’t care anymore!!”  
  
_ She had nothing to lose. He smacked her to knock her back into her place but she _truly_ didn’t care anymore: she took a hard swing at him too. Nothing mattered whatsoever. The man that fathered her had been stunned senseless and her mother came to hold her back, insisting that it wasn’t appropriate. The same as it hadn’t been appropriate he’d been beating her mother for her whole life either. No, she…she decided then she had no ‘place’ anymore. She had absolutely nothing now.

She’d had so little to begin with but one by one, it was plucked away. Her own self-interests, her own self-dignity, her sense of self, her own autonomy…then to persecute and make her look like a terrible human being to the only man she’d ever love and he died thinking she was some hollow awful monster that only used him? Led to believe this by the man that kept this power by beating her _mother_? The one moment she couldn’t defend Shin and now…? Now, he was gone _forever_?  
  
It…wasn’t worth it.  
  
Pressing her hands to her mouth, she shut her eyes, trembling. She wasn’t sure what got her through that time. Under different circumstances, she’d have gone off and perhaps drank herself to death or overdosed, perhaps. She went back to school and just…muddled her way through life. Her father didn’t’ communicate with her and her mother insisted that she just…try to move on and cope. Easy…for her to say. If…anything her mother wouldn’t understand, it was how it felt to love a man and then losing him to his kind ambitions. And losing him when he _hated her_ and she loved him so much.  
  
When school was completed around a half a year later, Lyla coldly went back home. She had no ‘choice’, as the man called and said his normal threats to her mother’s personage. That’s all Lyla had left: her mother. Or…so she thought.  
  
Being at home for that one day had been hell itself. Her father invoked power on her mother alone. Apparently her punch to the jaw must’ve scared him enough to not push it with her but…the woman that had been long battered and broken would never touch him. Okamoto Lillian, as horrible as it was to say, was the weak link he meant to exploit to keep her in place, to solidify the fortune of others. He didn’t care…about anyone but himself.  
  
Lyla had almost wished they cut the little path where she and Shin used to play down. The memory killed her and robbed her of numbness, the detachment from this she needed to make it. Walking down that lane, she just tucked away and sat there for some hours, reminiscing and hating herself more than anything. She…she couldn’t speak of weak links, she was one too.  
  
A rustle. It was the rustle of a person entering the little domain that used to be hers and Shin’s. She looked up and found a familiar body turning away. It was unusual for Koji but maybe he just…wanted a place to think. She remembered asking him if everything was all right. He was so strangely optimistic that Shin would be back last she saw him, it…it was heartbreaking. Koji had had so much happen to him, to…to lose his older brother too?  
  
Shin made sure she got to go to her first concert. Nirvana. He made sure she got to wear her first outfit that made her feel like she had an identity and made sure she was comfortable with that. When they went to the hall, she feared the…journey. She didn’t get to make journeys, after all, she was trapped for the most part. Except, when she was with him. Yagami Shin offered his hand that day and it…it had never failed to be available to her until she was forcibly detracted.   
  
‘Koji’ had stopped. He seemed to be shaking and she went up to grasp his hand to give him comfort. Maybe it was just setting in.  
  
…It was callused. A bit hardened and scarred. But, something about it felt…like what part of her life she’d been able to have. The presence, the aura…? It felt…like the home he’d given her.  
  
Delusional, maybe? That was her first thought, she was finally losing her mind. She squeezed a little tighter but more and more it felt like a hand she never thought she’d get to touch again. The fear in…in facing this spirit that came to their jungle. She had to see though. Coming to face him, her heart stopped when she was met by the ocean of blue she thought she’d never see again.  
  
His face had been so tired and haggard, a mixture of somehow pale and tanned He had scars on his face too, what was showing of his hair down to his shoulders. Even the eyes seemed…off, perhaps just a hint too dark from what she’d framed in her memory. Just…she… _“…Shin?”  
_

His voice murmured back like silk: _“…Hey, Lai.”  
  
_ God, it just couldn’t have been. Not after having everything in her life taken away. Not after everything was she finally— _finally_ given something back. She had touched his face, trying to get rid of this hallucination but instead he touched her hands, closed his eyes. He…  
  
She couldn’t believe. She couldn’t. Speak of faith, and she had none. She’d never had any, she wasn’t even sure what that _meant_. She could only break down in the suffering of it all and he took her inside, explaining. He explained how he hadn’t crashed in the ocean, that he fought the entire time. He made his way back and he…he held her, insisted that, despite it all, _in spite_ of it all, he never hated her.  
  
She…couldn’t believe it.  
  
He looked like he had a world of suffering behind his eyes. The same Shin he’d always been, he was more concerned about what _she_ thought despite him _never_ being anything but a genuine person that cared for her. Her baka. She kissed him and he kissed back in relief, like there’d been some question on who was supposed to despise who here. Her silly, silly Shin…

He explained the circumstance, that he was supposed to be in hiding, but she’d heard what she needed to hear: he wanted her to stay. Yes, it was selfish, self-centered, maybe…maybe even egotistical but she heard what she wanted to hear. She wasn’t certain what she’d need to do…but she wasn’t leaving Yagami Shin again. Even…even when she went back to her home after her father sent that message indicating she was ‘out of her mind’ and needed to ‘think about someone other than herself’, she had no intention of staying. She…she was done just accepting ‘terrible’ and ‘okay’.  
  
She…she only wanted ‘right’. And Yagami Shin was beyond ‘right’, he was perfect. He tried to explain how different he was now. Did it hurt that she couldn’t snuggle up with him spontaneously now? Or that sometimes, yes, like last night, he’d get out of bed and go sleep on the couch? Of course. It hurt to see the man she loved suffering with something he couldn’t physically fight because he’d been scarred by doing the right thing. The _right_ thing though. She would…she wouldn’t ever see him as less than perfect for his issues.  
  
Stretching, she stood and went back to putting her things back together. She was going to work on it. She was willing to stand up for Shin but she…she needed to stand up for herself too. She had dreams, she had goals, she had an identity—she was a valuable person and she…she was valid. Maybe not to her father, maybe not to Shin’s Yaya, but she…she was worth it not only to Yagami Shin but she…she was worthy to herself. She’d…she’d get to have a wedding with the man she chose, she’d have his children—or maybe, she wouldn’t. It was okay.   
  
No, she’d…been taught to accept ‘okay’. After every trial and toil, this? This was more than okay.

Next time? She would stand up for this proudly. This…this was worth everything.   
  



	21. Side Story: Second Chance

**Side Story:** Second Chance  
  
 **Author’s Note:** I know for almost a _fact_ I have this title somewhere else but it’s poignant here. This is the final side story and will follow Jill mostly during the period of Shin’s Prana period (Set before Chapter 14: Funeral) . Enjoy!  
  
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June 12, 2002.  
  
“…Well, I’d…hoped to give you both your presents when you brother arrived but I guess he’s in flight or something.”  
  
Yagami Jill stood beside her twin brother, Tony, the latter standing there in the foyer of the house with his arms crossed and looking aggravated. “Yea, yea…”  
  
Their father shot a look in the direction of Jill’s big brother, Yagami Koji. Koji’s brow was ticking but he remained quiet, his twin, Yagami Nelly, simply shaking his head. She couldn’t blame Koji, really, he had really been getting into it with Tony because, frankly? Tony was an asshole. He woke up an asshole, he went about his day an asshole, and he went to sleep an asshole, only to start all over again the next day with the same disposition. There was some general admission in the house that he was the least liked family member right now.  
  
 _“Did they ever fucking make Shin or Koji or Nerimaru work, huh?! This is bullshit!”  
  
_ Jill rubbed her forehead, sighing to herself. That was his general gripe to her every single day and she was sick of advising that their parents had made the perfectly logical argument that Tony would not be getting money from them for doing _nothing_. She still had an allowance because she went to school as did Shaun. Their older brothers didn’t have to work but most of them did _while_ still getting allowance for going to school and helping with the house! It wasn’t _difficult_ : you were not going to be the special one that got paid for _nothing_.  
  
She didn’t understand what he was thinking. She…didn’t have really an ounce of herself left _to_ understand what he was thinking, she…she had other things on her plate. Following her dad outside, she looked up and gasped. Well…maybe she had room on her plate for this.  
  
Side by side, there was a silver 2002 Mercedes E-Class and a red 2002 Chevrolet Camaro Z28 convertible. Papa! Yamada smiled, nodding, “Not quite the Camaros I grew up with but I think it’s pretty spiffy for my princess.”  
  
“Thank you, daddy!” she squealed, hugging him tightly.  
  
“Of course, my little lady” he rumbled, embracing her, “Happy 16th birthday.”  
  
“We better not catch you Speed Racering around in that thing” heckled Nelly.  
  
Jill stuck out her tongue at him but Koji smiled, “I think it’s a good option for her.”  
  
“Thank you, nii-san, at least you don’t suck” Jill pouted.  
  
Nelly made a face and finally looked to Tony. “Let me guess, _Sunshine_ : it’s not the right color.”  
  
Tony’s hands were in his pocket, looking…not particularly stricken that he had a damn _Mercedes_ provided to him for his birthday. Ugh, this was why no one liked him right now. Finally, he bowed, “…Thank you, dad. It’s really nice, I wasn’t expecting this.”  
  
‘But you definitely could have just given me the money it cost to buy the car’, was what he was thinking. Yamada smiled some, “Well, it wasn’t _as_ bad as I thought, especially since it’s getting to be late in the year. You’re welcome, son.”  
  
Tossing them the keys, their dad nodded, “I have to get back to work but you’re okay celebrating your birthday Saturday, right?”  
  
“That’s fine, papa” Jill nodded.  
  
“We’ll still get cake and stuff for tonight” Koji assured, heading back toward the house, “Be careful, you two.”  
  
“Yes, please” Nelly drawled, “We already have _two_ daredevil siblings out there.”  
  
Yagami Shaun, the youngest, usually took off early on his bike so he could pick up his best friend for school in the morning. He definitely was a mile a minute. Jill watched everyone enter back into the house, leaving only her and Tony. He looked peeved. “…Seriously.”  
  
“Seriously, they…purchased you a brand new car you didn’t have to fund and you’re preparing to come up with some complaint?” she said dryly.  
  
Tony threw his hands up, huffing, “I can’t work for this _monthly payment,_ Jill—or if I did, it’d be all I made in a month! Look what they can throw around and they’re making me go to work?!”  
  
“Then don’t work, baka! This is a _gift_. You don’t know what deals papa could have made on this or if he bought it up front, but the fact of the matter is you can’t expect them to just fund you goofing off. THIS is different!”  
  
“Whatever” he grunted, “I have to _work_ so I’ll probably work through our fucking birthday.”  
  
Staring after him, Jill said: “…Happy Birthday, futago.”  
  
Tony paused at the top of the steps. She didn’t expect him to say anything because he was just that person right now. She wasn’t even meaning to wait for a response. Alas, he said lightly, not turning back, “…Happy Birthday, Jill. Have a good day. Really.”  
  
She smiled, nodding as she headed for her car, “You too.”  
  
He wasn’t beyond saving though. He was just…really frustrated and self-centered. She knew deep down he was still her cantankerous but caring twin. He just…was going through some things right now.  
  
…So was she.  
  
Hesitant, she went to her new car and started it up. It hummed like a dream and she already loved it. That meant though…she was taking something she loved that her papa just bought her to a warzone. Pursing her lips, she nodded as she calculated that she could park at her friend’s house which was a five minute walk from the school. Absurd, but…she supposed her brothers had been right.  
  
 _I'm just a kid and life is a nightmare. I'm just a kid, I know that it's not fair. Nobody cares 'cause I'm alone  
and the world is having more fun than me tonight.  
  
_Jill snickered, going up the road and rolling the window down, feeling the light early summer breeze in her hair. If Koji were here, he’d fuss and complain about this ‘whiny teeny bopper bs’. Maybe he just didn’t get it. Or…he did. Because, again, he’d been right.  
  
“Oh my Gosh, Jill! Is that yours?”  
  
Pulling into her friend, Diane’s, yard as the young girl came out, Jill nodded, clapping her hands. “My dad’s gift. I think it’s super cute…and I want to _keep it super cute_ so you think it’s okay I park it here?”  
  
“Of course, my parents don’t even drive so this driveway is a total waste” scoffed Diane, “As long as you promise we go for a ride later!”  
  
“Of course!”  
  
They walked together toward the school, chattering, the rest of their group convening at the front. Jill indulged deeply in those ten minutes of calm and camaraderie. After this, she…had to enter the minefield.   
  
When she walked into the door, she held her things close, trying to keep her eyes trained as a particular set of gazes pinned to her immediately. Every day for almost two years now? Like Koji had said…men _could_ be kind of trash. Or at least this jerk.  
  
Going to her locker, she took a breath to prepare herself. What was it today? As soon as she entered the combination and opened the door, she found a sheet of paper with big bold letters indicating ‘SLUT’ and ‘WHORE’. Naturally. Balling them up absently, she checked her school shoes before pulling them on, carefully making sure her lock clicked into place. She left it loose a few times and had holes in her heel for a few weeks.  
  
Parting ways with her friends, she filed into her classroom and sat down. The desk to her left and right were empty at the request of two girls. The teacher allowed it, seeming confused. Jill didn’t care, it was just so…dumb.  
  
There were whispers as she took her notebook out for class, the same old topic that had to have been disinteresting to _someone_ by now. No, their school must have been _that_ boring that they held onto her ‘mistake’ like water in the desert. Jill hated it here.  
  
It was a party she went to with her friends. There was a boy. His name was Maro. Supposedly Maro was interested in her and had approached her at said party. Maro heard things about girls that looked like her…or had supposedly heard things, anyway. He insisted that she…  
  
…She despised her brother’s overprotective streak with a passion. It made her unequipped on dealing with the opposite sex because they were generally terrified of advancing with her due to the fact she had three crazy older brothers with reputations. She’d had two boyfriends but, well, they all panicked and dumped her. Yes, all three of those onii-sans of hers were out of proximity but…  
  
It was that first year that Koji, Nelly, and Shin were gone that Maro came to her at that party and insisted. She despised her brother’s overprotectiveness…but everything else they taught her, she…she would never admit it to them but she was very much glad they taught her. ‘Consent is the name of the game’ always rang in her head. She didn’t have any interest in Maro and his command that she come blow him in the bathroom of the house party? No, she did _not_ consent and it wouldn’t happen.  
  
So, naturally, because how dare the ‘whore blonde’ turn _him_ down, he started the rumor that she had given it up to about three different guys that night, _including_ him. The gossip spread like a dropping a match in gasoline and everyone from girls in other grades to guys coming into high school started to deem her the ‘easy one’. She had literally touched maybe _one_ penis and that guy took off in fright because he thought he heard Koji. She wouldn’t even _know_ how to do half the stuff they claimed she did.  
  
God. Jill sighed to herself as she picked up her pen, preparing to take notes on math. She couldn’t even…tell anyone. Koji probably would actually consider having Maro killed. _That_ was her beloved nii-san’s main problem: some people were joking or at least just making baseless threats. _Koji_ though? Koji was fully capable of anything he said and sometimes, just sometimes, he meant it and went through with it. She’d never forget the guy that said he was going to sneak into their mansion and ‘fuck her’ to Koji to bait him. Koji promised the bastard he’d need to have his jaw relocated and find new teeth. Ten minutes later, said bastard was missing about ten teeth with a dislocated jaw. Nelly? Nelly wasn’t _much_ better but he was sometimes calmer. Just…he was definitely going to tell Koji which defeated the purpose.  
  
Shin…her oldest brother had tried, picking up that she was miserable, but he…he had so much on his plate already. It seemed so petty and silly in comparison to his fighting in foreign lands. She might tell him when he got back but…that would just depend.  
  
Shaun did go to school here so she figured he _knew_. Just, if he did, he made no inclination that he knew. That wasn’t how Shaun operated though so she concluded that people kept their tongues around him specifically. Not that she’d put that on her baby brother anyway…  
  
When Tony realized he’d much rather be doing anything else than come to school, he dropped out. That was before her predicament else she wasn’t really sure what he’d do. He certainly wasn’t like Koji, he never was really protective of her. She was sure he wouldn’t _like it_ but that was null and void, he’d…he didn’t care anyway.  
  
So, it was just her. She could tell her parents but once it reached that level, the backlash she’d face from their involvement would make what she was already going through worse. However much she wished she could drop out like Tony, she knew that…that wasn’t the best path to take. Tony got worked to death too, having found a job in a grocery store. He worked close to 45 hours a week, by which point she wasn’t sure how that was any better than school. He always complained about the ‘shit pay’ too, another reason he was pissed their parents would gift him something so expensive. She tried to explain that…that was going to be it? Like, if he didn’t complete high school, that’s pretty much the only jobs he’d get unless he got an apprenticeship. He’d just quietly walked away…  
  
No, she…hated it here but she had endeavors that probably needed her to finish at least this degree. She wasn’t going to college. After this nightmare, she couldn’t envision just going to the next level of it. If she made it out of _here_ , she’d count her blessings. Jill balled her fists when a girl walking past her whispered lowly ‘cum slut’, pursing her lips. No…  
  
…It really couldn’t get much worse than this.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

No. Life…life could most certainly get much worse.  
  
Yagami Jill had gone out Saturday with her friends happily, oblivious. The weekends made up for everything that was going wrong during the week. She didn’t have to think about people or their fabricated rumors or stupid pettiness. The problems stayed in school.  
  
How naïve of her. Koji called her just as they were about to head to the mall around five. “Imoto, something’s wrong. Mom said dad’s in a panic, I…I think it might have something to do with Shin.”  
  
What? What…what about him? He was supposed to be home a few days ago. They just assumed…what had they assumed? He was late? Jill bit her lip, looking at Diane, Daisy, and Nannette, her friends that stayed solid and true to her through this nightmare, and whispered after Koji directed her to go home: “Something might be wrong with my brother that’s overseas.”  
  
“Oh no, Jilly” Daisy rasped, her brown eyes widening, “Do you want us to go with you?”  
  
“T…Thanks, Daze, but—but I’ll be okay” she smiled shakily, “Let me drop you all off, I’m-I’m sorry.”  
  
“Don’t be silly” Nannette scoffed, hugging her, “Call us if you need anything, okay? We’ll check on you on AIM tonight.”  
  
“O…Okay.”  
  
The drive home was dreadful. Her mind was…racing. What could she say about their oldest brother? Koji and Nelly would address him as a ‘saint’. To some degree of how unhinged they could all be, Shin was generally the calm and collected one, often the peacekeeper amongst them.

She’d…she’d been horrified when he graduated that he wanted to go overseas to help the Terran Initiative. All they knew of war was…was death. It meant someone was going to try to kill you. She…she had been so mad that his selflessness was selfish to them. Just…that was her brother, ‘the saint’. He caught her with her first boyfriend just making out. That’s all it was going to be, she was sure of that, but he…he didn’t tell Koji or Nelly. If it’d been them, oh God. But Shin…?  
  
He came back from his first tour of duty mostly the same. Maybe a little more cavalier since he’d been away from home for half a year. She…really hadn’t spent too much time with him in the scheme of things. She had just…been caught up in her own problems. He knew she had them but she…she couldn’t tell him. Again, it was such a petty thing to stress someone with real problems out with. On top of _her_ problems, she just watched her twin be an absolute pompous, selfish _asshole_ during that time in horror. Shin was literally in two battles before he got home and Tony was complaining about not having money neatly dropped off in his credit card so he could goof off all day.   
  
Biting her lip, she _prayed_ it was just some…inconvenience with Shin right now. She didn’t…didn’t want Shin to have gone thinking that his siblings were selfish brats. Save for Shaun, both she and Tony had…hadn’t been there enough when they last had him around. Tony…God, Tony. He almost had Shin getting into fist fights on his behalf. Shin probably thought they were…brats. Or worse.  
  
When she arrived at the mansion, she panicked. Everyone was home, even Nelly which was increasingly rare. He had spent more of his time at college to make up for his lackluster first semester. It looked like Tony was here too and Shaun’s motorcycle was haphazardly parked. Oh…oh.  
  
Jill ran into the house, her heart thundering in her ears. Running through the hallway, she came to a screeching halt in the kitchen. Yagami Yamada, their usually stoic yet calm and collected father, was seated at the table with his face in his hands, shaking. Oh. Jill helplessly looked around, her brothers standing there in…confusion, Koji leaning against the wall with his arms crossed. Nelly was leaning against the counter beside Shaun. Her mother was seated on the other end of the table, staring. “…Yama, Jill’s here. What’s going on?”  
  
Looking to Tony, Jill was briefly provoked to slap him since he looked…irritated, like this was an inconvenience, like _none of them_ even mattered. This…this was still _all they had_ in this room, why did he care so little about them?  
  
Her dad never surfaced, his breath echoing against his palms. Jill took a seat and stared at him. In…her heart, she knew. Just…   
  
“…Shin is dead.”  
  
No. This was…this was far worse.   
  
“…What the hell are you talking about?” Koji whispered.  
  
Their father just rested his fingertips against his forehead, his body trembling. “…His…his leader called me, told me that…that Shin was…was doing a supply run and-and that…that the last tracking they had had him over water and they…they can’t…find him or his body. I-I got a follow-up, over a hundred people are missing and they’ve been looking for five days. They-they can’t find him and they’ve declared him dead.”  
  
“…Oh my God” Nelly rasped.  
  
Jill choked, covering her mouth as her chest closed and squeezed. Oh God. Oh God. “N-No. _No_.”  
  
Tony stared at their dad…before walking away because this was just a _gigantic inconvenience._ Jill dissolved into sobbing, retching. No, this…this was _beyond worse._  
  
“…N-Nothing, huh? Got no feelings for this one either?”  
  
Confused, she looked up as Nelly icily voiced these words. What? He was staring angrily at Koji…who appeared very passive. _What_? _Why_?! Koji looked away but he didn’t seem… _sad_. What was _wrong with them_? “…I feel…concerned.”  
  
“ _Concerned_?” Nelly demanded.  
  
Koji shut his eyes, shaking his head. Nelly balled his fists, stalking closer, “Can you get your mind out of fucking fairy tale mode _for once_? Shin is not _miraculously_ out there alive somewhere, waiting to get back here!! He wouldn’t just go magically missing if something wasn’t gravely wrong, you dumbass!!”  
  
… _What_? Jill gaped at Koji incredulously. _What_?? He went down in the _water_ , in the _ocean_ , Shin couldn’t _survive that_! “I won’t argue with you, Nelly.”  
  
“You are _ridiculous--_ ” Nelly snapped, starting at his twin.  
  
“Nerimaru.”  
  
Oh. Mama. They all looked to her and Jill…expected her to be in shambles. That was her _child_ , her _firstborn_. Instead, much like Koji, she seemed calm. _What_?  
  
“…Not you too.”  
  
Dana folded her hands, shaking her head, “…It…it doesn’t feel right. When…when he got shot, I felt something. I can’t describe it but I _felt_ for his life. I…I don’t feel it here right now. And I-I may be _wrong_ but I…I’m not ready to accept this just yet.”  
  
 _Why_?! Why _else_ would Shin be missing?! Jill wasn’t _flabbergasted_ but she was _sick_. How could they be this… _optimistic_? Her papa…actually chuckled. It was coarse. Bitter. Defeated. “…You and your faith.”  
  
“What would you have me do, Yamada?”  
  
“Look at the _facts_ : he was in a dangerous situation that had his life on the line and they finally managed to take it from him _hours_ before he was supposed to come home!!” Yamada snapped, slamming his palms on the table. His face was flushed and his eyes were glossy. _He’d_ lost a child.  
  
Her mama leaned back, staring at her father. How? Didn’t they know this defiance was just as _hurtful_ as the loss?! This didn’t make sense! “…Cope how you need to, Yama. I already made the promise and I’ll keep it.”  
  
“You’re carrying an empty load” he hissed.  
  
“I’m carrying what I need to” she countered simply, “And until they deliver my firstborn’s, whom I dragged myself through the mud to see live, corpse in a coffin, _I’m_ not burying him.”  
  
She couldn’t take this. Jill launched to her feet, wanting to scream at them. _Nothing_ worked out correctly, why couldn’t any of them _see that_? This whole _existence_ was just a gigantic mess of things _not working out_!! After _everything they’d gone through_ , how can they _possibly_ believe?!   
  
The declarations strangled her and she was robbed of the breath to utter them. Instead, she rushed away to her room to cry, Nelly calling after her. This…this was far worse.   
  
…School would end one day and all those untrue rumors and people would fade away in time. She’d…get her life back possibly. But Shin…Shin would never come back and he…he died thinking some of them were too self-centered to care. He _wouldn’t_ come back.  
  
This…this was agony.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
“Jesus” Koji muttered.  
  
Jill weakly sat in Shin’s section of the house, staring into a threshold that may never be inhabited again, at least not by its rightful owner. It was the next day and…she’d hoped some sense or something would have settled into Koji and her mom but it didn’t seem so. Koji was still…resolute and her mother had actually packed her main machines and a ton of fabric from her shop to come home. She…was keeping vigil for Shin’s return. They…they were _serious_. How?  
  
While Koji and mama were gathered and calm, their father? Not so much. He apparently woke up early this morning and raced Shin’s Toyota Supra out of here with the Honda in the trunk. Yamada had yelled that it had to go, despite _everyone’s,_ except _Tony,_ who went to fucking _work,_ request that he not. Dana had looked panicked _then,_ standing in the driveway as their father sped away, kicking up dust. _“…Koji, Nelly, there’s some lock and key doorknobs in the garage. Can you install them on Shin’s bedroom doors for me and give me the keys?”  
  
_ …What did it matter? Who were they even saving _things_ for? It didn’t matter. Koji and Nelly silently did what they were told, currently drilling the locks into place while their father was away. Like he couldn’t kick them down. Nelly was working on Shin’s entertainment room the door over, his jaw taut. “…This is a reaction to losing someone, something you clearly don’t understand.”  
  
Usually Koji was the irate one, the hothead that would be blazing and ready to start a fight. Nelly apparently took the role as Koji was being the measure headed one… _incorrectly_. He was an inferno all other scenarios but the one he should be emotional about. He just quietly continued to work before saying softly, “… _If_ Shin is gone, and I _mean_ ‘if’, I would _hope_ dad would allow us to keep some sentiments of his. Shin wasn’t only his son.”  
  
…Oh. Jill swallowed hard at that as Nelly shot Koji a brief look. Pursing his lips, Nelly muttered, “…Well, I guess I agree to that—the keeping sentiments part, not the blatant defiance of _sensibility_.”  
  
“Whatever.”  
  
Nelly surged the drill, pulling away and dropping it by his side, his brown eyes raging as he turned to Koji. “You really can’t grasp this, _can you_? They _lost track of him_. He went down in the fucking _water,_ KOJI. Shin is not _Superman_! Whatever bullshit you made him promise, life doesn’t work _out like that_!!”  
  
“Maybe it doesn’t” Koji murmured, picking a screw up out of the packet, “…But you’re not going to force your feelings on me, Nerimaru. I’m ready to wait and keep hope and you’re not. That’s all there is to it and you can get the fuck off me about it.”  
  
Jill looked to Nelly for his response. He…was just red. He probably was ready to physically attack Koji because that’s how they were sometimes, just…ready to fight. Nelly…wanted to commiserate with someone and usually that was Koji. It _couldn’t_ be Koji if they weren’t even in the same book, let alone not on the same page. Nelly stomped past them, marching down the steps and slamming the door of the house behind him. Staring after him, Jill glowered back at Koji. His brows were furrowed but he was still focused on his task. _Ugh_.  
  
“…He needs you, Koji. He needs you to show compassion, especially since even _mama_ won’t. Dad _can’t_ , he’s a _wreck_. Nelly needs _you_.”  
  
With a sigh, Koji pulled the door shut and locked it before walking over to finish Nelly’s portion. “…What would you have me do, imoto?”  
  
“Be _sensible_. Life is terrible and terrible things _happen_!” she declared.  
  
“So do good things.”  
  
About to bite at him about how could he possibly say that, she recoiled. Staring at her brother who…was not a hundred percent aware about how exactly terrible life could be due to his own experiences, Jill grimaced and looked down. Right…she knew…exactly how terrible life was. Koji was…was missing a few chapters. “…Yes, nii-san.”  
  
“I’m not belittling your feelings, Jill, or Nelly’s or dad’s, I never want you to think that” he said softly, looking to her, “Just…my gut isn’t letting me go in that direction yet, okay? Like mom said, maybe we’re wrong, maybe we’re crazy, but…I know Shin. Shin’s not a…he’s not someone that submits when the going gets tough, that’s…that’s why I was able to support him. He might have had his doubts but I know the type of person he is. You guys do what you need to live with this, I just…I’m not there.”  
  
…Still. “…I respect your hope, Ko-chan.”  
  
Even when it was misguided. He smiled and stood, picking up the plastic containers, “You needn’t patronize me, princess. I’m okay being the insane one, as usual.”  
  
Somehow she had to pout at that as he collected the power tools, heading back down the steps, “How’s Tony?”  
  
“How should I know?” she muttered angrily, “He doesn’t even care. We’re just garbage to him.”  
  
Surprisingly, Koji glanced back at her with a disapproving look. “Really, Jill, that’s your twin. Give him a little more credit and thought than that.”  
  
“How can you _say that_?” God, what was he doing, just producing positivity?!  
  
“Just don’t look at Tony as so black and white. He is _definitely_ flawed but there’s a complexity there you might be missing. I don’t even think he’s that far gone” Koji insisted.  
  
He didn’t even _stay_ last night. He didn’t check on _any_ of them which was as self-centered as usual. He went to _work_ this morning! She didn’t want to delve into _anything_ , he was a _monster_.

Koji insisted that he was going to make her breakfast since no one had apparently eaten in the last twenty hours. She was…far too young. Almost a newborn, in fact. All she knew was that Nelly and especially Koji had taken care of her most of her life. They all coddled her extremely and watched over her religiously up until they started college. But Koji? Koji…always protected her.  
  
She’d gotten angry about it once. She was eleven and Koji had deterred a boy from approaching her about getting ice cream, something incessantly innocent. Nelly pulled her aside and explained it to her. It…had been explained to her one way before but the way he put it changed the perspective entirely. When…they weren’t with their father, when they were born in the house of the man their mother had been forced to marry, that demon, Domo, apparently threatened her. Sexually. He…threatened to assault an _infant._ Koji…Koji, even at that young an age, apparently vowed with everything he had to protect her then. Nelly insisted that, even though Koji was forced to lose those memories of his own torture and assault, he still carried that feeling, that vow.

She had been…speechless. It didn’t mean she _liked_ that he terrified anything identifying as male that approached her but…she got it. It made sense. It made his hope that Shin would cross back through those doors make sense too, he…didn’t have that memory of the world’s injustice. Koji, even as an entire enigma, made sense to her.  
  
Tony though? He…went off the deep end and she didn’t want to understand him. She…she lost two brothers.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _“Koji?! Jill!? Nelly?!”  
  
Jill was startled by the voice as she sat in their living room later that day, crying quietly to herself. Nelly had returned, still angry with his twin, and curled up with her, rubbing her back. Koji was doing his homework. Just…uncanny, really. About as uncanny as the voice that just interrupted this sphere of mourning clashing normalcy.   
  
Okamoto Lyla rushed into the room. They…hadn’t really seen Lyla in two years. Jill hadn’t heard the gritty details but, from what she’d heard, her and Shin had had a major falling out over…well, her dad deriding them and saying her now dead brother was a worthless human being. The franticness in Lyla’s eyes though indicated that…she’d not shared that opinion.  
  
“…Hey, nee-san” Nelly murmured.  
  
“What’s going on?” she choked, “I-I saw it in the paper. They’re lying, right? They’re lying.”  
  
Nelly glared toward Koji who remained quiet, still working steadily, “…Per SOME people in this room, it’s a lie. But…I’m sorry, Lyla, they…they can’t find Shin. They say he went down in the water and…he’s been gone over a week now.”  
  
Jill bit her lip as Lyla covered her mouth, whispering ‘no, no, no’. “I-I didn’t—I didn’t even…”  
  
Koji looked up with a frown as Lyla burst out of the room, rushing for the front door. “…Aww, shit.”  
  
He stood up and apparently…followed Lyla wherever she went. Nelly made a face and slowly shook his head. “…That…has to hurt. To…to have ended one of your longest friendships that way, to have…his last memories like that. I don’t envy that.”  
  
No. Koji and Nelly, also Shaun, they…would only ever have great memories of their last days with Shin. She…spent his time here wallowing in her despair over a stupid rumor at school. Tony…spent that time being an asshole that almost got Shin into fights and screamed at him like the spoiled brat he was.   
  
No. Speaking of value, she…didn’t put any value into time with her sibling either. Like Lyla, she’d…she’d never get that valuable time back. Unlike other people, people she was born with, that…that bothered her to her core._  
  
Two weeks. That was the amount of bereavement time that they got to take for Shin. Nelly used his but Koji went steady back to school. She thought that was a bit too extreme but he admitted he wasn’t sure his disposition wouldn’t just make Nelly feel worse, so he wanted to keep his distance.   
  
Considerate. Jill wasn’t even sure how Koji and mama kept it up for these two weeks. When their dad came back to discover they’d thwarted his attempts to annex Shin’s memory and things from the house, he essentially went to work and didn’t return. He…was a mess. And, sometimes, when Jill went to check on her mother, she’d find the woman in deep tears…before she just collected herself and seemed calm, strongly in belief that Shin was just missing. It was… _nuts_.  
  
It was her fault because Shaun typically was the odd one out, he…was the youngest. She spoke of being self-centered but it took her a few days to realize she hadn’t received his feelings. Alas, was she _surprised_ to find he’d taken Koji and Dana’s side? No. Just a nice split. It wasn’t even without Shin but they weren’t all on the same page…  
  
Jill didn’t want to come back. She wanted to take a page from her ‘twin’ and drop out before she had to come back to this. To hear people spread petty gossip about her after all this? It’d…it’d be too much. She swallowed hard when she parked in Diane’s yard, shaking her head. But…Shin died under far more severe circumstances than adolescent shenanigans. He had wanted her to at least have a high school education and that’s…that’s what she’d do, no matter what it took. She…she wanted to honor his requests.  
  
“Oh, Jilly, sweetie” Diane gushed, coming out of her large house to give her a hug, “Are you sure you’re ready to go back?”  
  
“No…but I don’t have a choice” Jill admitted grimly, closing her eyes.  
  
Diana looked resolute, holding her shoulders, “Anybody gives you any problems today, Jill, I _know_ they’ll look like shit for it.”  
  
Yea, okay. Taking a deep breath, she walked with her friend toward Subami High School and awaited the usual routine. She’d hear whispers and snickers and have to see ‘whore’ and ‘slut’ written in her locker. She might have tacks on her chair or in her shoes. People…were miserable.  
  
Entering the building, she kept her head up as she walked through. It didn’t matter. She…she would get through this. For…for all she failed to enjoy with him while he was alive, she’d keep his wishes. For Shin.  
  
Alas, she couldn’t help notice that people…weren’t whispering, kind of quietly keeping their heads down and not saying anything. When she went to her locker, there were no angry messages at all. No, just…her shoes the way she last left them. What…? Almost amazed, she walked to her classroom and was met by _more_ silence. Was…was Diane right? Were people concerned about the appearance of harassing someone that just lost a close relative?  
  
…She would have _never_ traded Shin for this.  
  
Glum despite this…blessing, if it could be ordained such, Jill made her way through the day in a fog. Her friends were concerned, saying they all had to leave today for appointments and Nanette was home sick. Jill assured she’d be fine, that…no one would bother her, that they couldn’t bother her.  
  
Wrong again. When the final class released, Jill collected her things and requested the last bit of makeup work from her teachers. They all issued their condolences and those that had taught Shin were saddened because he was such a good person and student. One made the offhand remark ‘if only he’d utilized his talent somewhere else’. Jill…didn’t know what to think of that except it kind of panged in her chest. She…didn’t like it.  
  
“Hey, look, the slut is back! Thought we’d finally gotten rid of her!”  
  
Maro. Jill was placing things in her locker, replacing her shoes. Looking up, her eyes narrowed as the bastard and his cronies approached. Yea. Wrong again. Maro looked smug, like he’d just missed these two weeks of torture he dished. Two weeks of sitting at home knowing she’d never see her brother again made his torture meaningless.  
  
Putting her bag over her shoulder, she was prepared to head out when one of the girls in Maro’s midst heckled, “Heard about your brother. That’s really too bad.”  
  
It was the tone. Jill turned to look at her, closing her hand. “…It is. Hopefully you never lose a sibling.”  
  
“Ha, whatever” Maro snorted, “It was really his own fault anyway.”  
  
… _What_? Jill stared at him. “…What did you say?”  
  
“You heard me. It was his own fault! What kind of stupid dumbass gets caught up in someone else’s problems? He got what he deserved” scoffed Maro.  
  
This son of a bitch. His parrot girlfriend laughed, “That’s what everyone thinks, stupid. They’re just too much of a punk to say it to you.”  
  
Oh. So people…were _still_ miserable wastes of air. “Then ‘people’ can go to _hell_ and your ugly asses better stay the hell out of my face talking about my onii-san” Jill spat, her jaw clenched.  
  
“Or what are you gonna do about?” the bitch sang, shoving her.  
  
Done. Just… _done_. Call her Yagami Koji’s sister, she was _beating this bitch’s ass._ Pulling her arm back, she punched the nameless trash in the face.  
  
She squealed, seeming shocked, as Jill came around and swung on her again. Everyone in the group looked _shellshocked_ as Jill began to motion toward pinning her to the ground. Enough. _Enough_.  
  
“H-Hey, bitch, stop it!” Maro snapped.  
  
At first, she wasn’t…quite sure what happened. It hurt, whatever it was, blinding her for a second and sending her toppling to the ground. When her vision allowed her to process, it found that Maro had apparently slugged her across the face, standing over her with his fist balled.  
  
Jill gaped up at him. It…wasn’t particularly incredulity that he’d hit her, no. She started it, at least the completely physical portion. She didn’t have to _hit_ whoever his bitch girlfriend was, it simply was a shove. However, before her eyes, Maro’s _dead body_ flashed. Koji came home every day now to get news on Shin and he waited to see her. He was going to see her with a GIGANTIC bruise and commit _homicide_.

“Oh my God” she squeaked, “My brother’s going to go to prison.”  
  
“ _Dude_ , her brother’s going to _kill you and us_!” squealed a guy in Maro’s posse.  
  
Maro blanched as apparently the general consensus in the group was he had _fucked up_. A majority of them scattered, just leaving Maro there with his battered girlfriend who looked incredulous at this reaction. “Y-You bunch of punks! Who’s her brother anyway?!”  
  
She was, literally, new here so she was _not_ aware _._ Maro quickly grabbed the naïve girl’s hand and ran, leaving Jill on the ground. _Assholes_. Staggering to her feet, her mind racing, she quickly grabbed her things and rushed for her car. Makeup.  
  
She…she needed makeup to cover the bruise! Rushing to her car, overturning it before she finally got it to start, she went to the store to hopefully find something _heavy_ to cover this. No, Koji would not _jokingly_ handle this, he was on _edge_ despite his optimism. This? This would push him over and she-she didn’t want to lose him too.  
  
Rushing in, she searched through the makeup aisle and located a thick foundation that should match her close enough. She picked it up and rushed to the front to purchase it. Really, she’d hoped it wouldn’t bruise but the cashier gave her a look. “…Are you all right?”  
  
“A-Ah, yes.”  
  
Great, now to get home before she got too many witnesses. Forcing the change into her purse, she almost made it out the door…  
  
“Jill?”  
  
She froze. Looking to her side, the side where she’d been struck, she found her twin brother standing there, holding a box. He stared at her, bewildered, before his brows furrowed deeply. “…What the hell happened to your face?”  
  
“N-Nothing! Gotta go!”  
  
“Jill, did someone hit you?” Tony demanded, setting the box down to get closer to her.  
  
No, no, no. “J-Just leave me alone, Tony, I’m fine!”  
  
Escaping his questioning, she jumped into her car and sped off for home, tears rolling down her face. Oh, this…this…this was _bad_. How could this get any worse at this point?  
  
“I-I don’t know if I can do it, nii-san” she sobbed.  
  
…She might not have what it takes.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
Optimism was absent. She had none, Jill was certain of that. But, was she entirely and completely thankful that the universe granted her favor when she got home. _Yes_. Koji had to head back early, Nelly was at school, her mom was on a rush order, her dad was still exiling himself to work, and Shaun’s friend, Ann, had taken him out to get something to eat. Thank _God_.

Pressing a cold compress to her face for the swelling, Jill miserably tried to do her homework. She couldn’t…focus on this anymore. It seemed so meaningless in the scheme of things, especially after getting hit at school for getting angry at monsters that spoke badly of her dead brother after two weeks. Jill dropped her pencil to hold her pulsing head. Maybe…maybe she could transfer to Wensington, the other nearby school. She…she wanted to keep her vow to her brothers but after this…?  
  
Jill jumped when there was a knock at the door. Oh God, who was it?? Terrified, she stammered, “W-Who is it?”  
  
“Ann.”  
  
Oh. Okay. Standing up, Jill slowly opened the door, a bit…puzzled. Sure enough, it was Annaliese “Ann” Robins, Shaun’s growing closer friend from school. Shaun seemed very taken with her, declaring she was from Wasaba and that her dad ran a maintenance shop. Apparently Ann was very skilled at fixing and repairs too. Her dad’s family was from America but he’d spent his whole life here, growing up, in fact, around Jill’s dad. Her mom was also not from Japan, having moved here under similar circumstances as her spouse. Ann advised that the woman died in a house fire when she was four so she doesn’t really remember her much…  
  
Jill’s eyes widened as Ann handed her a bag of food from what looked like McDonalds. “Shaun said you probably haven’t eaten but that you hate his guts so he asked me to bring this up to you.”  
  
Sulking, Jill grumbled, “I do not ‘hate his guts’, he’s just too damn…hopeful for me right now.”  
  
Ann snorted, “It is sort of crazy. Where’d you get the shiner?”  
  
Dang it. Jill groaned, walking back into her room as the fourteen-year-old followed. “You don’t seem like the type that gets into fights. Boyfriend?”  
  
“God, no” Jill mumbled, “…It’s a long story. Please don’t tell Shaun, I want to try to keep it hidden for now.”  
  
“Because you wanna get revenge on your own, gotcha” Ann nodded.  
  
Somehow, Jill just…smiled at that, wide-eyed. Ann was…very much a Wasaba type person. Very brash and street savvy. She was a beautiful young woman, a little short and lanky, her face gracefully covered with many freckles, and her naturally red hair pulled back into a ponytail. People probably underestimated her because she was pretty but Ann probably would have kicked that whole group’s ass today. “Y-Yea.”  
  
… “Ann, can…can I ask you something?”  
  
“Sure.”  
  
“…I know you were really young when you lost your mom but you…you probably still remember her. Does…does it get any easier?”  
  
Ann made a face. “…I guess that’s one good thing about Shaun not believing your brother’s dead, he hasn’t asked me that yet.”  
  
Oops. “I-I’m sorry, forget it.”  
  
“It’s easier because it has to be. You don’t have a choice unless you end it all or you just stop focusing on anything else” Ann said bluntly.  
  
…Damn. Ann looked off before shrugging, “The hardest part is knowing you don’t get to make new memories with them. You only get to hold on to the old stuff but that…the story ends right there, it’s difficult. You…you don’t know what to do without that character and then you just…have to keep going.”  
  
…Oh. Jill swallowed, aware of how…story writing went. “…We…really have to keep writing with a character gone.”  
  
“I guess.”  
  
…Okay. “Thank you, Ann, for the food and that.”  
  
Ann nodded and left. Jill opened the bag and nibbled at the fries, pressing the ice pack to her face. So…she had to keep just going, huh? Just…let the story flow even though a main character was missing. That…  
  
That was simply the worst feeling.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
…Life was going to be long.  
  
She woke up early the following morning, dabbed on a quarter of a bottle of makeup, put a hoodie on despite it being early July, pulled the hood up, and fled the house. Did she need to? No. Her dad was still hiding out at work, her mom was asleep, Nelly and Koji were still butting heads, Tony was gone, and Shaun was still about his normal routine since Shin wasn’t dead in his mind. She…was alone here.  
  
Driving herself to school, she went about her normal routine. Diane nor Daisy thought anything of her sudden fashion choice. Good, she…she’d let them get hit by the rumor mill at school.  
  
When they arrived, Jill prepared for people to call her violent or finally say, ‘yea, we agreed with her: your brother did deserve it!’. Her stomach felt heavy and sick. Maybe…she could seriously request to change schools.  
  
…Once again, she was startled to find most of her classmates still not paying her any mind and her locker unbothered. Oh. Maybe…maybe they were over her. Huh.  
  
Jill grimaced when suddenly there was confused chattering in the halls. Oh no, was it Maro? Maybe Maro was still stirring up nonsense…looking up, following the train of gossip, even _she_ was confused as hell.  
  
Yagami Tony had wandered out of what looked to be the locker rooms. The _hell_? What was he doing here? She stared at her twin in complete befuddlement as he adjusted a… _school uniform_ on his torso. He looked entirely, absolutely, and completely disgruntled. Daisy looked stunned. “…Did your brother decide to come back to school?”  
  
 _Unlikely_! A couple of Tony’s friends approached him, questioning. He…just shrugged. What?!   
  
Well, this was _weird_ and far more interesting than her nonsense! Tony caught sight of her as she marched up to him. “Tony, what is going on?”  
  
“…Nothing. Just bored of work, thought I’d come back to school for a while” he grumbled.  
  
“Um, _what_?”  
  
Tony gave her something of a look and she almost squealed. _DUMMY, what made you walk up to a family member with this glob of makeup on your face?_ “O-Oh, okay!”  
  
God, idiot. Before he could question or demand, the crowds started to empty, signaling class was about to start. To her pulsating _horror_ , Tony ended up following her to the room. They had _classes together, no_. Tony walked to the teacher as she scurried to sit, handing him some papers…  
  
… _Wait_. Tony couldn’t just waltz in here and say ‘I’m coming back’, he didn’t finish his Freshman year!! Jill gawked at his…audacity as the teacher read whatever her twin handed him and also seemed shocked. Wait, _did they let him_?  
  
Sure enough, Tony walked over after being given books and slammed down right beside her, thankfully not on the bad side. STILL. He looked…absolutely _aggravated_ like he generally looked, like this was a waste of his precious time. Why did he come back then?! And why’d they let him skip a year of school?!  
  
Jill was…just blown away. This…didn’t make a lick of sense. Tony stared at the board absently as the teacher started their algebra course. God, she hated math. Some idiot once told her it’s because girls were bad at math. No, her friends were _brilliant_ at math, it had nothing to do with gender. _She_ was terrible at it.  
  
Trying to take diligent notes, knowing that if she ended up in cram school this year, she was _not_ going to make it, she glanced at Tony. The teacher had written a long formula and his eyes had creased. That was one of those weird paradoxes. She was of the history and writing language preference. Tony _excelled_ at math and science. The look in his eyes was almost like he’d…forgotten that.  
  
He looked…cross all of a sudden, staring at his books. What? Jill stared at him…  
  
She reached into her bag, slightly…uncertain and grabbed an extra notebook she kept for writing notes to her friends and a pencil and slid it over to him. Tony looked to her, blinking, before slowly taking the offering and flipping it open. He started to write down the formula and plug in the numbers their sensei produced. Really? He just came without any supplies? What was his deal??  
  
Class switched to chemistry and…well, she could actually say she was okay in chemistry. Far better than any of the other sciences. Tony seemed bewildered as the teacher went over covalent bonds. Similar to algebra, they had to balance chemical formulas. He scribbled them down quickly, tapping the pen against his chin thoughtfully. If…she didn’t know any better, she’d say he was enthralled.  
  
At the end of the day, Tony looked…weary but his face had returned to his normal annoyance. Jill stared at him absently as he went out to the parking lot. “…Going to work now?”  
  
“…No. I have to go to _more_ school.”  
  
…Huh? “…Why?”  
  
“It was the agreement so I could be placed in the appropriate classes” he shrugged, adjusting his bag, “I have to go to night school for the core classes until eight.”  
  
… _Jeez_. “O-Oh. I-I mean, Tony, it’s…random, you wanting to go back. Why?”  
  
“No reason. Where’s your car?”  
  
Dang it. “Uh, I…I park it at Diane’s house since I study there after school anyway.”  
  
His icy blue eyes closed some at her, like he knew she was just full of crap. Finally, he shook his head and started toward his Mercedes. “…I’ll see you at home, Jill. Thanks for the book, I’ll replace it.”  
  
“N-No problem.”  
  
Standing at the front area, she…wondered if this had something to do with Shin? Maybe…maybe he wanted to…  
  
…Bleh. She wasn’t going to make anything up for him. Who knew why he wanted to come back _finally_? A little annoyed, she went to find Diane and the girls, a bit…frustrated.  
  
But…she had to admit, having him here had…really deterred a lot of the behavior she’d been faced with. He had _sort of_ lingered near her when his friends weren’t excitably goofing off with him. There was a very…clear difference and she felt…as good as she could given two weeks ago she heard a member of her family died.  
  
…Maybe just all of a sudden she didn’t feel quite as alone.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
“Wha? What are you even doing here?”  
  
Jill couldn’t help smirk some, looking up when Shaun suddenly came to their table, looking very confused. Tony was sitting a few seats over from her, talking with his friends. Generally speaking, Shaun was on the move and in the younger class so they didn’t cross each other often. Despite the fact that Tony had been back in school for two weeks now, this was apparently the first time Shaun saw him.  
  
“…I am attending school again” Tony sulked.  
  
The youngest just raised a brow, taking an empty seat across from him. “…For how long?”  
  
“…Dunno. Til I’m bored again.”  
  
Baka. Dean, one of Tony’s few close friends snickered, punching his arm, “Idiot, you might as well _stay_. You’re already 11th in the damn grade, fucking overachiever.”  
  
God, it infuriated her but he just breezed in here like it seriously did not matter that he missed that first year of school. He could be his normal indifferent ass all he wanted but he was genuinely _excited_ for chemistry and sometimes math, to the point he was in the classroom before others preparing. He tried to say, ‘oh, I just need more help’ but that was a lie, he took the first test and _aced_ it. Meanwhile she’d been sitting here getting average regularly attending school! Ugh. But…then, it was hard to focus being made a mockery of.  
  
Even though a handful of people choosing to sit at this table with Tony were guilty of belittling her as ‘slut of the year’, her twin seemed completely unaware that her presence would not have been accepted. Usually she sat in that corner with her three friends and other less hypocritical girls. They most likely peeled it back out of respect to _him_ but was that supposed to make her feel better?  
  
Jill frowned when one ornery kid she wasn’t sure was Tony’s friend or not sort of sneered at Shaun. What? Shaun would never hurt a _fly,_ he was a sweetie! “…You hang out with freshman, Yagami?”  
  
Um, what? Tony gave the guy a weird look, “…I mean, I will…make exceptions for my little brother?”  
  
“Jesus, how many brothers do you guys have?” the boy demanded incredulously.  
  
Jill swallowed hard. Tony gave him a stony look. She almost expected him to just…ignore it, like he had been for the last month. However… “…Less than what we once had.”  
  
Her eyes burning, Jill picked at her rice as Dean frowned deeply at the impertinent rambler, “C’mon, dude, watch it. They just lost a sibling.”  
  
“With that many, does it matter?”  
  
…Ugh. Tony’s jaw grew taut as she glared angrily at whomever. Shaun patted her back suddenly, looking calm, “…Don’t let it get to you, nee-san. No one could ever get it.”  
  
With that, he got up and left as she gazed after him, startled. What? Tony stood, stuffing his hands in his pockets, “I just remembered I gotta make a phone call. You can have my dessert, Dean.”  
  
“A-Ah, okay…”  
  
Watching after her twin, Jill…was half provoked to follow him. It…wasn’t like he was upset though. Mr. Insensitive Ass looked confused. _“What_? I mean, c’mon!”  
  
“Stop while you are in the ground, _dead_ , idiot” Dean grunted. “No one wants to hear the reckless remarks of a sibling-less bastard.”  
  
Good ol’ Dean. Jill gave him her dessert as well, dismissing herself to go get in some study time…maybe. She looked around for Tony but…couldn’t find him. Somehow, Koji’s words to her the day after Shin’s passing was announced came back to her. She…thought he was just being really black and white but…maybe she was misunderstanding him. Really, after his spirited talks of hating school, she never thought she’d see him _enjoying_ it. Also, he…finally made some sort of remark about Shin, even though it was vague.  
  
…She guessed…he wasn’t the only self-absorbed one. She wasn’t sure…how Tony worked anymore. Maybe she was reading too much into it but…it was already a more complex storyline than she’d perceived. What was going on?  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
“Nii-san, you need to stop.”  
  
Yagami Koji was stretched out on the couch, almost motionless. The sacks under his eyes were so dark and he looked far paler than he generally did, especially in the summer. Jill covered him with a blanket, pouting. She…didn’t want to create a hierarchy. And she didn’t, just…even if he drove her _nuts_ with his protectiveness, if something ever happened to Yagami Koji, especially after Shin? There was no amount of motivation she’d be able to find to go on.  
  
But he just covered his face, mumbling. He’d sauntered in around seven on this Wednesday evening and asked if they’d heard anything. _No_. They weren’t _going_ to hear anything different. He was driving an hour every single day to come home and see if they’d ‘heard anything’. Optimism…had its limits.  
  
After he insisted he do chores, his body finally said ‘enough’ and he ended up passing out. He clearly couldn’t move, exhausted. His body was sturdy but it had cracks. He had to _maintain_ himself and he wasn’t doing that right now. She stroked his hair and pouted at him. “Nii-san, just…rest, please? For me?”  
  
Looking very cross, he finally shut his eyes and grumbled, “…Fine. Just this _once_ I will take a day and rest. I guess I won’t miss anything too pertinent right now.”  
  
Smiling at that, Jill kissed his forehead as he dozed right off into a heavy slumber. Baka. He…he was really hopeful.

It’d been almost two months now and…nothing. Nothing. The more time passed, the more Koji should have lost hope. And…she could tell he sort of was. He looked a little…dejected when mama reported she’d heard nothing now. The woman in question though, she…she still seemed strong and resilient. Jill went to the hospital to check on her dad since he wasn’t coming back _here_ , apparently, and he was just…destroyed. Two…months.  
  
Jill looked up when she heard the front door open. It was about 8:30 so that usually meant Tony. Indeed, her twin walked in, his face drawn and tired. She smiled at him. “…Okaeri.”  
  
“Mm. Tadaima.”  
  
Yawning into the back of his hand, he looked to Koji, his eyes closing some. “…Why is he here?”  
  
“Mm, he came to check to see if we heard anything.”  
  
“…Sure.”  
  
She frowned as he rubbed his blue eyes, mumbling, “…Did…did you want to go grab something to eat?”  
  
Eh? Startled, Jill stared at him as he sleepily stuffed his hands in his pockets, his eyes shut as he was clearly about to collapse. “I-I wouldn’t mind but I can make you something, you look exhausted.”  
  
He waved a hand, mumbling, “Nah, I’m fine. I’m starving. I was thinking kaiten-zushi.”  
  
…Usually, the brothers would all go there. It wasn’t like she _wouldn’t_ go but…she always wrapped herself up in something unrelated when they went. She…supposed she better not take it for granted. “T-That sounds good.”  
  
Tony nodded solemnly, rubbing his face for the umpteenth time. “Great. Uh…can you drive?”  
  
“Sure” she smiled, standing.  
  
“Bring me some tekkamaki…” mumbled Koji.  
  
Jill almost laughed. It was the closest she’d come in a while. “I thought you were _asleep_ , nii-san.”  
  
“I’m hungry and sleepy…” he grumbled petulantly.  
  
With a smirk, Tony drawled, “Then get up and let’s go.”  
  
“Sure, if they can just deliver the sushi to the floor where I’ll be lying in a coma…” he groaned, turning over on his side.  
  
Petting his hair, Jill smiled warmly. They were…still so silly. “I’ll get you some sushi, nii-san. We’ll be back in a few.”  
  
Walking with Tony to the door, she jumped, a little surprised, to find Shaun outside kind of…behind their mother’s car. Huh? Her brows furrowed when another young man popped up beside him. Oh…Luke. He was another of Shaun’s new…friends. He had dirty blond messy hair, shaggily hanging in his face over his dark blue eyes. He nodded at them, patting Shaun’s shoulder as the younger looked…startled? “I’ll see you tomorrow, Shaun.”  
  
“Oh, yea.”  
  
Luke climbed onto an old motorbike and waved at them as he sped up the driveway. Huh? Tony blinked languidly at Shaun who was scratching his forehead. “…We’re going for conveyor belt sushi. You game?”  
  
“Huh? Uh, sure.”  
  
…What was wrong? Truly confused, they went to her car and Shaun got in the back seat while Tony got in the front. Since it was a nice night, she put the top down and they cruised the few minutes to the restaurant in silence, just light music echoing from her radio.   
_  
__'Cause we lost it all. Nothin' lasts forever. I'm sorry I can't be perfect. Now it's just too late and we can't go back. I'm sorry I can't be perfect…_

Tony rested his chin in his palm, staring out into the just setting sun. “…Can I turn this off, Jill?”  
  
“Eh…? Um, sure.”  
  
He clicked off the radio and the silence was only thicker. Woah boy, this was going to be…some dinner.  
  
When they arrived, there wasn’t much of a wait since it was a Tuesday. Taking a seat next to Tony, her brother reached and grabbed the first roll without abandon, Shaun doing the same. God, boys. She snickered, shaking her head, and carefully selected her dish.   
  
“So, Jill…”  
  
Hmm? Tony had a roll pinned in his chopsticks, staring ahead at the conveyor belts before clearing his throat. “…So, Dean was telling me about something.”  
  
…Oh no. “Um…what?”  
  
“He said that some guy said…you…gave him head at a party?”  
  
 _Damn it_. “I _didn’t_.”  
  
“Oh, well, I figured _that_ ” Tony rolled his eyes, “But he said the whole school has been giving you shit for it and the bastard said you blew a whole bunch of other guys in retaliation. Who is he?”  
  
Jill glowered at her twin, shaking her head, “…It doesn’t matter, Tony. He’s not bothering me _now_.”  
  
Shaun sulked, “I didn’t hear about that. Everyone always told me I have a pretty sister.”  
  
Great, the brother brigade. Rubbing her temple, Tony drank a bit of his water, grunting, “…If you don’t want to tell me, don’t. Just…”  
  
He trailed off. What? Shaun shook his head, grabbing plate number two. “I mean, even if nee-san _had_ blown some guys, who cares? Half the school has.”  
  
“Including you, baby brother?” Tony snorted.  
  
What now? Shaun leered at Tony who just smirked at him. “Look, you two _suck_ at being covert. You might as well bring him inside and fuck him instead of screwing around around mom’s _car_.”  
  
Eh?! Jill stared, wide-eyed, as Shaun rolled his. _What_? “…I-I mean, Shaun, I-I guess I’ve been super self-centered but a-are you… _out_?”  
  
“I don’t know what I am” Shaun sulked.  
  
What?? Tony yawned, “…I mean, I won’t _lie_ : I get a little…curious but, like, that’s where it stops. I almost doubt I’d even like it.”  
  
Well, this was a night of revelations. Shaun frowned, taking a bit of nigiri before nodding, “…I’m confused because I don’t _not_ like girls. Like, I really, really like girls. It’s not like, society telling me that’s what’s normal either, I _like them_ and I’m attracted to girls. But…I mean, I’m pretty equally attracted to guys too the same exact way. It just seems wishy washy.”  
  
Oh. “W-Well, that’s bisexuality, right?” Jill questioned.  
  
“Maybe. Luke says he’s like Tony, though, just experimenting. I don’t know if he actually likes it or not or if he’s just super horny.”  
  
 _Holy crap_. “…The _baby_ is having sex and _I_ get a smack on the hand for even kissing a boy?” Jill demanded, growing irritated as she set her chopsticks down.  
  
“I don’t really care, go wild” Shaun said simply.  
  
“Do _not_ go wild” Tony glared at him before looking at her, “…I do apologize that it’s _different_ , Jill. It is some bullshit that it’s different…but you had some ‘mystery guy’ you won’t tell me about make up an entire story about you going down on him that spread throughout the school. There’s double standards at play but we…we don’t want you to get hurt.”  
  
Meh. “…I’m not having any problems, _futago_. And I’m going to keep in mind that I’m the only one not allowed to have a sex life because of ‘double standards’.”  
  
“Who would you even want to _go with_ at our school?” Tony sulked, reaching for a tuna roll, “It’s a whole bunch of fucking losers! They’re not anywhere good enough for you!”  
  
Wow. “I had literally _no_ idea you were like our older brothers, baka” she remarked, deadpan.  
  
Tony scoffed before looking down. “…I wish.”  
  
What…? Jill frowned as he suddenly looked forlorn. What was the matter? Shaun, Mr. No Filter, sighed, “Yea, you’re not even in the same neighborhood, let alone the same ballpark, as our nii-sans.”  
  
“You know what, ya’ brat--”  
  
She bit her lip, again surprisingly amused, as Tony put Shaun in a headlock, the latter screaming in horror that he was going to waste his sushi. So silly…but…  
  
Not…so black and white, huh?  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _When they got back home, she…felt better. Or okay? Or…trying to fit pieces back together that weren’t quite right. Koji was knocked out on the couch but, her oh so ridiculous brothers, when she set the sushi down beside him that she got made to-go, he popped right up. They…were so special to her, she…she missed Shin so much. Why…?  
  
Sitting down at the foot of the chair, she dissolved into tears. Why? They were a family. They all…fit together perfectly so why did a piece have to get destroyed for no reason? Her sweet onii-san died…SUFFERING. Unless he just instantly died in an explosion, he probably suffered and he didn’t deserve it but now? Now a piece of their family was missing.  
  
Koji groaned. Mr. Hopeful. He pulled her to his side, rubbing her shoulder, “…It’ll be better.”  
  
“How? How can it?” she hissed.  
  
“I don’t know. One way or another, it’ll get better. Just believe me.”  
  
Yea, right. He still believed Shin was Superman which was sweet and endearing but so unpragmatic it was heinous. But she…supposed the younger would think highly of the older. Apparently, Tony did or… “Nii-san?”  
  
“Yes, princess?”  
  
“Remember…what you said about Tony not being so black and white?”  
  
Koji nodded, pushing a roll into his mouth. Jill bit her lip, whispering, “I…I think I see what you mean. I…I guess as we got older, we started to drift but he’s…way more complex than I remember. He’s just…not very open.”  
  
Tony was quiet once again on the car ride back and, as soon as they entered the house, he retired to bed…but, understandably, he was tired. Just…was that all?  
  
“…Maybe that’s one reason I haven’t given up on Shin yet, Jilly” Koji suddenly murmured, surprisingly soft, “I just…know that I still need him to be there.”  
  
…Oh. Kissing her temple tenderly, he closed the plastic bento and leaned back on the couch, closing his eyes. “…Just try to be there when Tony needs you. He might not open up to any of us but I believe he’ll open up to you.”  
  
Really? “And you…be sure to open up to him a little too, okay? I’m sorry we made you guys so withdrawn.”  
  
Pouting, Jill shook her head miserably, “…You didn’t. Life did.”  
  
“Life can go suck a dick” Koji groused, “…We’re all we have for right now, imoto. That may change one day but…you’ll never be alone, understand?”  
  
…Maybe.  
  
_“Oh my God, Jill, I work with this _sexy_ guy. I think he’s perfect for you!”  
  
Jill raised a brow as she pressed her phone to her ear, putting things away in her locker. Self-centered 101 again, she didn’t notice Daisy was missing. The girl had to start working because her family was going through a rough patch. She was still attending school but had to leave pretty much during study hall to start her shift at a grocery store. Taking her brother’s words to heart, she checked up on her friend. That had to be rough.  
  
“Oh yea?”  
  
“Yes. He’s blond with blue eyes and he’s tall. Perfect!”  
  
Snickering, Jill droned, “He sounds like he could be my brother, dork. What’s his name?”  
  
“Um, Isazaki or something? I don’t know his first name! Want me to ask him?”  
  
“No!” she laughed, “Just focus on working. I’ll try to come by and scout this ‘perfect guy’ one day.”  
  
“Look at that: her brother just dies and she’s already dick hopping!”  
  
Oh no.  
  
Jill was…in slight disbelief that this being was going to speak to her after punching her in the face. She slowly turned her head to confirm that Maro and his parrot girlfriend were back, their same crew still around them. _What_? “…I’ll call you back, Daisy.”  
  
“Eh? Jill--”  
  
Clicking off, Jill stared at him through narrowed eyes. “…You have some audacity speaking to me after last time. I thought you learned.”  
  
“Learned _what_? That the legends are bullshit?” Maro sneered, “Your pussy brother didn’t even show up!”  
  
“Because, _dumbass_ , I don’t want my brother going to jail over your worthless ass” Jill countered briskly. “I didn’t tell him.”  
  
“Yea right. The Yagami are just a bunch of punks” snorted girlfriend.  
  
Sure, whatever. Prepared to separate from this situation again, she jumped when Maro grabbed her arm roughly, looking snide. “So, whose dick are you running to now, huh?”  
  
“Get your hands _off of me_.”  
  
“Why? You didn’t do shit about it when I hit you last time, you must like that shit!”  
  
God. _God_ , why were her brothers right? If this was the loser pool she had to choose from, she may as well become a nun! Snapping her wrist away, she opened her mouth to tell him to go to hell. Instead, the moment was replaced by a chuckle.  
  
Freezing, Jill looked back in wide-eyed shock as Tony sauntered up, his hands in his pockets, Dean nearby. “…Took longer than I wanted it to but I figured the fucker that hit my sister was going to surface. Wasn’t expecting a fucking guy either.”  
  
Maro looked startled. Tony…was about four inches taller, hit by a growth spurt some months ago. His girlfriend looked nervous as Tony positioned himself in front of Jill. “I’m not good at mincing words so I’ll just say it upfront: if I ever see you near my sister again, I’m ending your life, son of a bitch.”  
  
No, no, no. “Tony--”  
  
“You’re gonna do _what_ by yourself, trash?” spat Maro, his group crowding.  
  
Dean cracked his neck, approaching, “When you’re dealing with cowards, two people are plenty.”  
  
“What is this, West Side Story or the Beat It video?”  
  
Jill’s heart raced as Shaun appeared from the gym area, Ann with him. The youngest raised a brow at Tony who looked…enraged. What was this?! When did this become a showdown?! “…This guy punched Jill in the face, Shaun. Either put up or get out.”  
  
Shaun looked confused, his brown eyes closing some, “What?”  
  
“Sluts ought to get punched in the face!” Maro proclaimed.  
  
Jill grimaced. Why…? Tony stared, tilting his head…before smiling, blinking…coyly at Maro’s girlfriend, “What? She blew a few dudes, right? Funny, don’t think she’s in short company.”  
  
The girl blanched. Maro stared before looking at her then looking at Tony…and gawking. “…Did you fuck my girlfriend?”  
  
“Maybe? I fuck a lot of girls. I’m the slut here” Tony shrugged.  
  
Yea, no kidding. Maro gritted his teeth, screaming, “I-I’ll fuck you up, Yagami!”  
  
“What’s wrong? My sister didn’t even give you the time of day, did she? She shouldn’t, everyone behind you is a fucking loser” Tony taunted.  
  
God, he was still a brat!! “That’s it, Yagami: I’m ending this now!”  
  
“Bring it on, _prick_!”  
  
Jill gawked as Maro threw the first punch and Tony retaliated _in full_. Maro’s girlfriend squealed, quickly scurrying away while the other guys jumped in to fight Tony. _How did this even happen?!_ Dean pushed her back and threw himself into the fray. Not _a second later_ did not only _Shaun_ dive in, so did Ann!!  
  
…Well, Koji apparently was right yet again: she wasn’t alone.  
  
…She was surrounded by _psychopaths_.  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
“Yagami-san, your presence here in school was on a probationary period. Starting a _mob fight_ does not reflect well upon you.”  
  
Principal Tabata, generally a very calm and kind man, was sitting behind the desk, staring at them pensively as they were gathered in his office. Jill smiled in horror, her hands folded in her lap, sitting between a slightly bruised Tony and Shaun, Dean slouched back casually beside the former and Ann sitting beside the latter with her arm stretched across the back of the chair. On the other side, all seven assailants including Maro were buckled over, groaning.   
  
“The Girlfriend” had run off and told that ‘the Yagami siblings had started a fight’. She was currently trying to treat Maro’s pretty thick wounds but he kept pushing her hands away, glowering. Yep. Hypocrites.  
  
Tony looked unbothered by Tabata’s declaration, blinking his slightly swollen eye. “…Yes sir.”  
  
Shaun pouted his broken lip, grumbling, “Tony didn’t even _start it_ though.”  
  
“He did so!” snapped Maro, his jaw the size of a balloon.  
  
“It’s unusual that Maro-san hasn’t been in a fight in his high school career until you came back, Tony-san” Tabata analyzed.  
  
Ugh, he should have had his ass kicked _several times_ before now. Tony pursed his lips as Dean looked to him absently. No, no, _no_. Tony…Tony was _good_ at school!! This-this _asshole_ was going to take this from him when he’d been working so hard?! Jill gritted her teeth, balling her fists. This couldn’t get any worse.  
  
There was a light knock at the door. Tabata looked up, drawling, “Come in.”  
  
His secretary peeked in, smiling…weirdly, “Um, the…Yagami guardian has arrived.”  
  
Oh, mama was going to have a _fit_. She was not trying to hear they were making trouble at school while she was waiting for the body of her oldest child! Jill looked up woefully…before the _air was snatched from her body.  
  
_ “…I…was not expecting to see you in this office ever again” Tabata said, baffled.  
  
“Hey, Tabata” greeted one _Yagami Koji_.

Jill couldn’t exactly…hear, because her heart was jumping back and forth in her ears. _No, no, no, no, NO-O-O-O._ Tony stared before whispering, “…Jill? _Jill, I…I can’t feel my arm, I think I’m having a heart attack_.”  
  
“ _Me too”_ she breathed.  
  
Koji bowed to Tabata, someone he was probably a little _too_ acquainted with from his turbulent time in high school. “My mom couldn’t make it. She also thought this was ample payback for the amount of times she had to come down here to bail me out after a fight.”  
  
Mama, _no_! Tabata rubbed his brow, “Well…I would hate to bother her with this after your brother’s passing.”  
  
“Mm.”  
  
Tipping his head at them, Tabata explained, “Your brothers and a few accomplices apparently got into a fight with the other side of the room. Per Kawaguchi-san, it was instigated by your brothers and sister.”  
  
That… _bitch_. Koji crossed his arms, raising an eyebrow. Shaun smiled awkwardly, looking full away as Tony and Jill tried not to die on the spot. If…it were _Nelly_ , it’d be _fine_. Nelly wasn’t one for details. However, Detective Koji Yagami, perceptive to a fault?   
  
Indeed, their oldest brother walked over to them, grasping Tony’s jaw and turning his face before going to Shaun. His brow drooped before he wandered over to the other side of the room, his arms returning to their fold as he observed Maro and his gang. While Maro and Kawaguchi, apparently parrot’s name, looked defiant because they were _idiots_ , his group looked absolutely and completely _petrified_.   
  
“Koji, what are you doing?” Tabata groaned.  
  
Rubbing his chin, Koji stared at Maro and nodded. “…I really didn’t think the youngest had it in them. Kudos.”  
  
Oh God. Tabata leered, “Koji, you don’t mean to _praise_ your siblings for starting a fight, do you?”  
  
Koji leaned over, peering rather rudely into a few of the guy’s faces as they actually saw a couple of them start to sweat. “Well, you see, Tabata-san, if you look at my brothers’ records, even before the one dropped out, they never got into fights. So, I can’t help but find it unusual they picked this strange day to just start one.”  
  
“We’re not lying” Kawaguchi snarled, her arms also crossed defensively.  
  
Jill couldn’t even _look_ at him but she _knew_ Koji was looking to her now. Oh God, please, please, she was wrong, this _could_ get worse, just let it end _here_. “Why’s my sister here again?”  
  
No-o-o. Tabata sighed, “She also was implicated as starting the fight, Koji.”  
  
“That’s laughable” Koji droned.  
  
“Koji--”  
  
Koji patted his cheek, staring off as if he were musing, “We’re rather on edge right now, Tabata, with what happened to Shin. You know best that I’m very protective of my sister but, well, we can tend to be a little protective of one another. So, the way this seems to me, my typically passive little brothers and their comrades got into it because someone was saying something about my unbruised and unrumpled sister.”

  
‘Oh my God, he’s Sherlock Holmes’ rasped Shaun under his breath as Jill rapidly shook her head, “N-Nii-san--”  
  
“So, what did you do to my little sister, hmm?” Koji questioned, smiling down at the “defendants”.  
  
Okay, if…they just…kept their mouths shut, everything could be fine. Why, Tony could go to Wensington! They could all go to Wensington and start fresh and forget any of this happened and Koji wouldn’t commit a homicide! Everything could still be _great_!  
  
“So what if I hit the bitch? It’s her own fucking fault for being so stuck up” spat Maro.  
  
The air just voided from the room, Jill having to cover her mouth to keep from screaming not because of anything that was just directed at her but the fact that he just said that to _Koji DAMN Yagami_. Shaun was fully gawking, actually reaching to grip her knee because _no_. Even Tabata looked horrified, having leapt to his feet.  
  
A split second. It would literally take Koji a slip of a second to have careened Maro through a glass window. Tony, somehow, _shockingly_ , managed to get up and dart between Koji and Maro, smiling and wide-eyed, holding his hands up. “N-Nii-san, wait. I-I handled this one. I’m Jill’s twin, I-I need to handle some of these cases _sometimes_. L-Let _me_ just have this one this time, _please_?”  
  
Tabata blurted, “I-I hadn’t gotten that far yet, Koji, I was entirely unaware this was provoked. W-We’ll just call this a wash an-and Tony, Shaun, and Jill are free of reprimand.”  
  


 _“What_?” Kawaguchi yelled, “W--”  
  
 _Finally_ , one of Maro’s ‘henchman’ hissed, “Will you just shut your _stupid mouth_ and read this room _?!”  
  
Please_. Jill stared helplessly as Tony looked at Koji beseechingly. Koji hadn’t…said anything, he actually didn’t seem all that taken aback. Perhaps because he’d heard crazy things directed at her for _years_ and he was just used to physically reacting. He gazed at Tony rather emptily for a silent moment before he looked to the crowd, his eyes just locked to each of their faces. Oh God.  
  
“…Okay, Tony.”  
  
… _Oh_. Koji patted Tony’s shoulder, nodding, “You did good.”  
  
Jill felt… _oh God_ , relief. She stood and clasped her hands, smiling as Tony rested his hand over his heart, breathing out. Oh God, it worked out.  
  
“…Ish.”  
  
Eh? In a _ludicrous_ blink and miss moment, Koji managed to reach past Tony, grab the front of Maro’s blazer, and one arm _sling him_ across the room against a bookcase Tabata had. Kawaguchi squealed loudly as all of Maro’s henchman screamed, scattering to hide in the corner. Oh.  
  
Shaun just sighed while Tony stared in the direction of Maro’s form that Koji flung like a _ragdoll_. Fucking…Koji Yagami. While she expected him to go over and beat Maro into the ground, startling her, he turned on his heel and walked toward the door. “I’m taking my kids, Tabata.”  
  
Koji swept his hands over the group, including Dean and Ann, directing them to leave. Tabata stammered, “D-Dean and Ann aren’t your kids.”  
  
“Sure they are. C’mon, kids.”  
  
“Yes, dad” Ann and Dean said drolly, somehow in unison.  
  
Jill quickly followed behind her brother, Shaun and Tony dragging in the rear of the group. Ann yawned into her hands, stretching, “Well, that was a lot more fun and entertaining than I expected to get over in this side of town. I gotta get to work. See you in the morning, guys.”  
  
“Yea, me too” Dean nodded before smacking Tony’s shoulder, “I’ll message you tonight, man.”  
  
Tony nodded weakly as just the Yagami siblings were left in the parking lot. Koji reached into his pocket and pulled out his black cigarettes, sticking one in his mouth and lighting up. Okay, it…wasn’t great but…it could have been…a lot more gory. Assuming her brother hadn’t been storing all of their faces in his memory so he could chase them down and murder them all later tonight.   
  
“N-Nii-san…” Jill whimpered.  
  
“Jill” Koji said sharply, “…I get hyper-focused on bastards being romantically or sexually involved with you. I get that _that_ seems like something you feel you need to hide from me though you _don’t_. But don’t you _ever_ keep some son of a bitch that hit you from any of us!”  
  
Wincing, she rubbed her arm and looked away as he turned to stare at her hard. “Do you hear me, Jill? No one is going to put their hands on you, hit and verbally abuse you, and get away with it, Jill! Why would you _keep that_ _from me_?”  
  
“Because you’re _crazy_ and I didn’t want to lose you too!! You’ve almost _killed_ people before for just _saying_ things, nii-chan!!” she choked.  
  
Tears escaped her against her will, just…so overwhelmed. She couldn’t do this. It…was too much. Koji rubbed his forehead, shutting his eyes tight, as Tony rubbed his own upper arm, looking down. “…You do take things too far sometimes, Koji. I…I mean, Jill didn’t tell me either so I…I do get it though.”  
  
Tony… Koji squeezed the bridge of his nose, his fragrant cigarette drifting into the summer sky before he took a draw. “…I’m sorry, Tony. You…you did great standing up for Jill, I just…can’t stand people that harm others unprovoked.”  
  
…Yes. Tony bit his lip, nodding, “I…I understand, Koji.”  
  
“You too, Shaun” he mumbled before looking to her, “…You? I need you to start trusting that I have _some_ sense and won’t kill someone.”  
  
Yea _right_. “…And, I need to work on being the person that you’re comfortable sharing things with, I see. I…I might be the oldest now.”  
  
Jill stared as Koji absently looked off at the bright sky. He always seemed so criminally unbothered at times, even right now. “…I really don’t want to be the oldest.”  
  
Biting her lip, her eyes burning, she nodded softly and cautiously hugged his side. He rubbed her shoulder, kissing her temple, “…Save for Tony who has class, I _will_ remand you remaining two to home as ‘punishment’. Whether I’m the oldest or not, your asses need to address _someone_ if something is going wrong, even if it’s not me.”  
  
“…Fair” Jill mumbled.  
  
Koji pinched the end of his cigarette butt, blowing out the last of the smoke as the door to the school opened, Maro and the remaining students stumbling out. Somehow, she had to smile when Maro, looking quite injured now, saw them and froze. However, she gawked when Koji slid his finger across his neck in gesture. _“KOJI._ ”  
  
“Little punk ass _bitch_. I catch him on the streets, it’s fair game” Koji snarled.  
  
“It is _criminal_. It is a _crime_ if you ‘catch him on the streets’, Koji” Jill leered.  
  
With a scoff, Koji turned and walked toward his car, “Get your cars or motorcycles home, I gotta take care of some things first.”  
  
Jill didn’t trust that _whatsoever_ and shook her head as he just sped off almost recklessly. Shaun gazed after him before his brows furrowed. Stuffing his hands in his pockets, he pursed his lips. “…That’s the first time Koji really, really suggested that Shin might…might actually be gone.”  
  
Wincing, Jill stared at him as Shaun looked…dismayed. “…I know it’s unrealistic but…”  
  
…Faith. What a…strange thing it was. To have faith in people especially, it seemed so…chaotic. It was literally no telling how another person’s presence would turn out in your life in so many different capacities. Life or death, trust or deceit, love or hatred…it was so human to believe yet so human to fail. Jill…wanted them to accept it but…  
  
Hugging her younger brother tight, she shook her head, “…If you have the faith, Shaun, hold on to it until you can’t anymore. It…won’t hurt to believe right now.”  
  
“…Okay.”  
  
He pulled away, sulking, “…Well, nii-san is right about one thing, nee-san: I might not be stupid protective about basic social functions like the others but no way am I letting some guy put his hands on you either.”  
  
Jill groaned, rolling her eyes, “…I may have punched his girlfriend a few times when she made a remark that everyone thought Shin deserved to be dead and pushed me.”  
  
“Man” Shaun said, weirdly musing, “Maybe nii-san’s right about that too, maybe we do need to catch them on the street.”  
  
“ _Shaun_ ” Jill snickered, “Thank you but let’s just…try to be peaceful, okay? I…hope no one else bothers us going forward.”  
  
“After Koji one arm threw the guy into a bookcase? Me too. I’ll see you at home, nee-san.”  
  
She nodded as he walked over to his motorbike that he built with Shin before their brother left one last time. He…was such a smart young man, to…to have gotten such a totem from their sibling to always…have. Even if it broke down and wouldn’t run anymore, he could always have that…  
  
Tony started to stalk away toward his Mercedes. They…were all they had anymore. “Futago.”  
  
He paused his escape, stuffing his hands in his pockets. She looked around, thankful the ground was mostly empty aside from some sport’s clubs doing warmups. Getting closer to her twin, she reached out and rubbed his arm, “…Did you really come back to school because you saw I got attacked?”  
  
“…Maybe.”  
  
Tony… “…And now that you’ve…found out what happened, are you…going to drop out again?”  
  
“Does it matter?”  
  
“Of course it does” she sulked, “You’re _good_ at school, Tony, and whether you want to admit it or not, you love chemistry and math. _And_ I bet mom and dad are giving you allowance again while you’re doing something you _love_. Just…give it some thought.”  
  
Tony just nodded. Ugh, like a brick wall. Coming to face him, she stared at him. He was stony as usual, avoiding her gaze. “…What’s wrong, Tony?”  
  
“Nothing’s wrong. Everything’s great.”  
  
“That is sure as _hell_ pushing it, Tony. Do you know how long this has been on me? Since you dropped out of school, I…I’ve been trying to get over this…this whole ‘being a slut’ rumor” she whispered, “It…it messed with me so much t-that I was stupidly distracted with it and-and trying to cope with _friends_ while I didn’t—I didn’t spend nearly any time with Shin and now he’s gone. I was selfish a-and now it’s over.”  
  
Ugh. Tears rolling down her face, she was about to…dismiss herself. Yes, she was…pretty certain that this chapter was over. If she understood the rumor mill that created this monster, this occurrence of her brother throwing someone across a room was about to slay it. Maro’s cronies would probably even say she never even told anyone and this was still the result. It was over…and so…so was her ability to make any memories with Yagami Shin. The…really last one she remembered fondly was riding in the car with him, Koji, and Nelly, listening to music and goofing off. That…was two years ago. That…was it.  
  
“ _You_? _You’re selfish_? Are you _dumb_?”  
  
Jill looked up, startled. Tony was glaring hard at her. What? “Wha?’  
  
“Were you the one that was busy trying to two time two different girls by telling them both you wanted a relationship when you _didn’t_? Even though y-you have manwhore brothers that, while _manwhores_ , weren’t _wrong_ in telling you that you don’t _toy with other people’s feelings_ because it’s a shit thing to do? W-Were you so stupid and cocky that yo-you thought you could keep that up? Did _you_ drop out of school w-with no real plan and, when you got the rug pulled out from under you by our parents, did you tell your older brother who was trying to help you to ‘fuck off’?”  
  
Jill stared as Tony shivered, “D-Did you get caught doing wrong and almost get him into a fight he had no business with besides your relation? D-Did you not even thank him for protecting you e-even though he was _right_ you were a spoiled piece of shit that should have faced it on your own? D-Did you—did you not ev-even go to see him off for the last time our family would see him alive?!”  
  
… “D-Did you start to realize y-you _are_ a piece of shit and he was _right_ a-and couldn’t even manage to talk to him on the phone when he called because you were so ashamed? Did yo-you not even say anything when he got _shot_ and almost died the first time?! Did you go almost a full _year and a half_ without having a civil conversation?! Did you just _fuck up entirely?!_ ”  
  
Tony’s face washed with tears, his lip shuddering, “Oh God, Jill, it’s too late. It’s too late, why? I can’t do anything to make it right now, I’m-I’m such an idiot-- _why_?”  
  
Shaking her head, she embraced him tightly as he sobbed into her shoulder. Ah. Koji…Mr. Perceptive. With a violent streak a mile long, she…would say he’d make a fine ‘oldest’. He…he knew they needed to drop those walls sometimes. They all…had their reasons.

There…was gray there.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 _“…Do you think he hated me?”  
  
_ Jill sat in her car for a while, staring at the Yagami Mansion where she’d lived for as long as she could remember. Tony asked that last week after the fight before he went off to school. While she thought he was fully deserving of a mental break, he advised he had to stop being a failure, waited for his face to calm, and went to school. Before he left though, he asked that. “ _Do you think he hated me?”  
  
_ No. Yagami Shin did not hate his little brother. He wanted Tony to do better and to fully grasp his potential. He was probably exasperated with him, certainly, but Shin was only frustrated because he knew Tony’s capabilities. He did, in fact, love his little brother.  
  
“ _I just…I just want a second chance”_ Tony had mumbled, _“…I wish I had the faith that Koji, mama, and Shaun have but…but what makes us deserve to get Shin back?”  
  
_ …It was almost September. Shin had been gone for over sixty days. While, as she hoped, her bullying at school had completely evaporated, replaced with fake nuances and overly friendly individuals that once spread false information like wildfire, hope had its limits. A second chance…was something that she could only write in a story now.  
  
Sighing, she finally got out of her car, heading for the front door. She fiddled with her keychain, finding the only other key aside from her car key and the fuzzy pink ornament to open the house. Turning the knob, she was about to echo that she was home…but was startled to find Koji Yagami sitting at the end of the steps.  
  
“Koji?” she frowned, shutting the door behind her.  
  
Her older brother had his eyes shut, reclined on the stairs. There was the scent of food in the background and what sounded like her mother…humming? It sounded so… _cheerful_. What?? Where did they get this positive energy?! However, her heart grew heavy when Koji opened his eyes and they were…somewhat bleary. “…Nii-san?”  
  
Koji stood and suddenly enveloped her in his arms. What? Confused, she rubbed his back. What? Was…was he okay? “Koji?”  
  
“…It’s okay now.”  
  
…Huh? He smiled some, tilting his head, “C’mon.”  
  
Jill followed, confused. What was going on? As they crossed through the kitchen, their mama looked back from the stove and scowled. It…looked like she was making skipjack sashimi. Shin…loved skipjack. “Don’t wake him.”  
  
“Of course not” Koji assured.  
  
Wake who? Dad? Koji walked into the living room and she followed, about to question what was going on. It was a pretty big deal if dad came home, but…  
  
Jill stared at the couch. It was a tall person, their body covered by the grey throw that usually adorned their couch, their mouth lightly agape as they lied cheek down on the couch. Their skin was bronze and very damaged in spots, whoever’s hair long and dry, one half brown and the top and roots a strange blond color. Their face was…very gaunt. _Who was this sleeping on their couch?!  
  
_ …’It’s okay now’?  
  
Her mind…was not registering. What…what was okay now? Who was…? She stared hard. If…she rebuilt in her mind, if…if she was crazy enough to embrace, it…sort of looked like…  
  
“It’s Shin, Jill.”  
  
“…What?”  
  
“It’s Shin. It’s a long story he can tell when he wakes up but he got back to us. It’s okay now” Koji murmured once more.  
  
Ludicrous. Turning to declare he was _insane_ and that they just couldn’t find some random person to replace their brother, she paused. Koji looked… _so relieved_ and at peace. This…this just…  
  
“…Nii-san” she whimpered, “…A-Are you…? Are you… _sure_?”  
  
“Nn. I talked to him before he went to sleep, Jill, it’s him. It’s Shin. He made it back to us. It’s okay.”  
  
 _How_? Covering her mouth, she trembled before turning back to him. With eyes that weren’t jaded with pragmatics and disbelief, upon second look, he looked to be the perfect height. The brown, while damaged, was Shin’s hair color. He had Shin’s nose. His lips were cracked beyond belief but…but it…  
  
“Oh my God. Oh my God” she sobbed, collapsing.  
  
Koji stroked her hair as she couldn’t even…manage to acknowledge that what she deemed a dead man was now snoring peacefully on their couch. How?! How on _Earth_ did he get out of the _water_? Where had he _been_?! How in any _universe_ did they get this _lucky_?!  
  
“Tony!!” she proclaimed, overwhelmed as she jumped to her feet. “I—I have to call Tony, he has to know.”  
  
He had to know that they—“Hold your horses there, girly.”  
  
 _What_? Why hadn’t he called them anyway?! Why was their mom just _cooking_!? She should have run out of the house to go _get_ their dad!! Papa! She had to go get papa! Koji held up his hands, a little wide-eyed, “Woah there, sister, you’re getting a little frantic. Listen: I don’t like it _at all_. Like, _at all_. But, Shin cannot have us announcing this to anyone. Not Nell, not Tony, not Shaun, not even Pop. We have to keep him a ghost to the world at large.”  
  
Oh, so she was dreaming. Miserable, she started to pinch herself to wake. Ridiculous. Koji leered, “Stop that. Look, he will tell the details and I am going to try to get everyone home incognito. I’ve already sent Nelly a series of heckling texts about how much of a punk he is for not coming home for three months and that he’s a bad son.”  
  
“Koji!” Jill gawked.  
  
“To get him here to make him feel better! We cannot communicate over any lines that Shin is here nor that he’s alive. He’s…still on a mission.”  
  
…Even _now_?! He looked _awful_ , he couldn’t complete any mission!   
  
…Who was she to say that? He…he had managed to get out of whatever disaster he was alive when she hadn’t…hadn’t had a speck of hope for him.   
  
Shaking, she swallowed hard and nodded. “…I don’t get it b-but, if Shin said so, I will agree. I-It sounds terrible.”  
  
“That it is” Koji agreed, kissing her forehead, “…But we got our second chance now, Jill.”  
  
Her heart skipped a beat as he walked away to the kitchen, speaking with mama. A…a second chance.  
  
They now…had opportunities to keep…making new memories now. They had the chance to…to apologize for all their indiscretions. They had time to rewrite some of them. Her brother wasn’t now a bloated corpse but, once again, a character in the narrative of life. It…it hadn’t been beyond life to be positive this once nor black and white.  
  
The…the chapters could continue. They were all together again.  
  
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
  
 **End Notes:**  
  
Man, I did not realize how much Simple Plan I listened to in this written year of 2002, jeez. Jill is listening to ‘I’m Just a Kid’ and when Tony asks to turn off the radio, they’re listening to ‘Perfect’ by the aforementioned band.  
  
Daisy and Nannette are based off characters from the Gameboy Color series. _Typically_ , or, when we first meet Jill in the first version of Step Toward the Future, she is written as this sullen type without friends but, well, I see all of the kids just not having _many_ now rather than none. Surprisingly, Koji, the most sullen of them all, has the most friends.  
  
Dean is the straight up rip-off of Owen and several other Bokumono characters that Natsume created but, well, I do need throw away characters especially since it looks like Marvelous seems to be geared toward doing remakes…  
  
Ann is based off Ann from SNES/Magical Melody, just to reiterate. Her real name is Annaliese as Ann from HM64/BTN/FOMT/MFOMT is present as a bit of an antagonist in Step Toward the Future. No promises but I may _slightly_ rectify her there. I’m still not a fan but I’m tired of my super villainous SIDE CHARACTERS. Like, damn it, Yaya!  
  
I may occasionally come and update this one if I feel like writing Sogen Ops stuff. FYI, if you’re a veteran to the series somehow, when Shin generally shows up to thwart a situation, it can be somewhat implied that his crew is with them. His steady sniper is definitely Komari.  
  
I ended with Jill because _now_ , I can get back to my Step Toward the Future remaster which, because of THIS story, I have to fine tune _again_. I would say I want to do Shaun and Tony’s story just in case that happens again but Shaun’s story is set during parts of STtF and Tony’s is kind of right after…see you soon.

~Always, Dark Ryuu


End file.
